UKC

Ok, so afternoon is errrrr after noon, but when does it change to evening?

Some say when the light is fading - but this means different times to us all, and would depend upon season as well

Some say evening begins after tea/diner/evening meal (a hint right there) but then what time is that as people eat at various times now

So, when do you consider evening to begin, and when does evening become night?

(its a slow day)

5pm is late afternoon 6pm is early evening 

I believe that there are actually some very specific definitions. Like twilight begins at sunset and becomes night once the sun is a certain number of degrees below the horizon. I don’t know about evening though - I guess, as you allude to, it is quite culturally defined since in mid winter twilight will precede evening by quite a margin for many people. 

5 pm is evening for me. Who would have afternoon tea as late as 5 pm?

6pm BBC News at Six

6.30pm ITV Evening News

Is it when you consider it acceptable to have a drink??

First G&T.... It's now evening 

I think you're referring to Civil, nautical and astronomical twilight... which I don't think give a definition for evening but rather go deeper and deeper into the night (or darkness, after what we would call sunset). I discovered these terms when investigating sunset times for hikes and other adventures!

After 6pm (tea time).

That's tea time to me, 4 would be preferable.

Evening meal at 7 or 8, depending on schedule and seasons.

4pm midsummer is a very different beast to 4pm midwinter

Some sympathy with the idea of whenever a drink is acceptable 

Definitely 6pm.

17:25 

Thems the bunnies, yes. I came across them through wanting to know what the light would be doing at different times for photography, although couldn’t remember the names.

Obviously. I'm not sure what the point of this thread is 

I'm sure there will be an official designation but to me it's 5pm, night time starts at 8pm, morning starts at 4pm and afternoon starts at 12am.

This is based on as a kid cartoons and kids TV used to finish at 5 (I think) and my preferred time to eat. 8pm is when I start thinking of going to bed and calling it a night (normally head up at 9 ish). If I wake before 4am it still feels like the middle of the night but after 4am it feels like early morning and I don't mind getting up. 

Evening starts when afternoon stops, not too hard really

Me, I look out the window

At 8pm the evening is still young. Maybe time to start thinking about eating.

When we lived in Eire, "Good Evening" started around about midday.  Rarely did you Good Afternoon. 

Reykjavik in summer - it's weird being in the pub approaching midnight with bright afternoon sunshine outside. Maybe evening is about an hour or two after midnight before it starts getting lighter.

Only if I want to be awake with indigestion. 

I'm posting this at 10pm, that's a late night for me. 

This won't help answer your question, but it may be interesting or amusing depending on your views...

The definition of evening is very important in Judaism because the religious "day" runs from evening to the next evening. But being Judaism, there are 23 (*) different opinions/definitions on exactly what constitutes evening 😁, and which one is used depends on 1) what you need it for, 2) whether you'll accept certain leniencies or whether you go for the strictest possible definitions (**).

An example, the Sabbath - one of the important "rules" is not to do any kind of work (includes work-work but also lots of other things which are deemed to be "work"). So, the Sabbath is brought in on Friday evening using an "early" definition (sunset) and goes out on Saturday evening using a "late" definition (dark enough to see 3 spaced out stars) which means that the Sabbath lasts for about 25 hours. But doing it this way means that nobody will inadvertently do work on the Sabbath when they hadn't meant to.

Judaism is full of this kind of "fun" stuff 😁

(*) - 23 is just made up, I don't know how many, but it is quite a few more than 1 or 2.

(**) - the idea of using lenient or stricter definitions/rulings etc may seem a bit weird to those not familiar with it (and to some who are), think of it as some people want the bronze guarantee that they're doing things correctly (lenient), whereas others need the platinum guarantee (strict). I can't offhand think of an obvious secular "behavioural" example.

I love a lie-in, but thats pushing it a bit, even for me. 😉

"It's Friday, it's five to five and it's...... Crackerjack"

Although originally it started at 17:15. 

On a week day this used to be simple.

If I am still working = afternoon.

If I have a glass of wine in my hand = start of evening.

But recently the glass of wine time has overlapped with the work time so now I am all confused.

The evening begins when I change into my PJs or whatever other slouchy, comfortable clothes I wear around the house and in bed.

Our local pub opens at 17.00.  I consider that to be the start of early evening. 

When the sun is setting but before nightfall

So it depends on the geographic location and time of year if not at low angles of latitude

Same here, it was "good morning" or "good evening". I seem to remember that "afternoon" was quite a late invention in order to single out a class of visitors who were not respectable enough to be morning guests but needed to be in no uncertainty as to their unsuitability as evening guests/dinner guests. Those whacky middle class Victorians!

The OED entry for "afternoon" has citations going back to the 14th century for the word's use as a noun, so blaming it on the Victorians seems ill-founded.  This web site says something similar: https://www.etymonline.com/word/afternoon

What the OED does say is: "Originally: the part of the day between the midday meal and the evening meal. In later use: the part of the day from noon or lunchtime to evening."  It also references the word "forenoon", which seems to be pretty much synonymous with "morning" in the sense of "that period time between waking/getting up and noon" (the typical usage seeming to be of the "we did X in the forenoon" type) rather than starting at actual sunrise.