What does “ish” mean when it comes to time?

"ish" means your time is not important enough for me to bother to plan for punctuality. It's kinda like reggae time. Soon come.

You waited 28 minutes. That's 8 more than I wait before leaving negative facebook marketplace feedback.
 
Hohn said:
Especially in this modern era of texts and various other IMs and such, there's simply no excuse for being late AND not letting someone know what's going on.
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Today, this is absolutely the case. Unlike some, I accept that stuff happens, causing someone to be late and depending on how late or how critical the arrival time is, you call or text to update the other person.
 
I can't stand to be late. If I don't know for sure when I can be somewhere I will say, "ish" meaning +- 5 minutes. If it varies from the +-5, then I will call them and say I'm sorry to be late and I will be there in X minutes.

I really bugs me when someone can't do that for me.
 
For me ish is +/- 5 minutes. For regular meet ups if they are late, they have no clue about responsibility & respect. If it's a first date, they are setting boundries about who the boss is going to be later on. seeing if you are a pushover or not. Just my opinion.
 
dogememe said:
Oh yeah. I’m back home now but VERY displeased. I’m the type of person that’s 5 minutes early to everything. I guess some people don’t respect other people’s time.
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I'm like you...on time if not early to every 'appointment'. I do agree with 'Grok' about 15 minutes due to traffic etc....which is a concern in heavily populated areas but not so much in the 'boonies'. I think it comes down to manners...it's bad manners to be flippant about other people's time but that's the world we live in today.
 
dogememe said:
Oh yeah. I’m back home now but VERY displeased. I’m the type of person that’s 5 minutes early to everything. I guess some people don’t respect other people’s time.
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I think that’s the real meaning of “ish” - it means “I don’t have respect for your time”
 
dogememe said:
yeah… the message I got this morning of “omg sorry I fell asleep” is not nearly good enough.

Better to find out what kind of person they are up front though!
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“Sorry I fell asleep” actually means: sorry but I met up with someone else instead 🫤
 
Depends on context

Work
Formal business meetings in office- no ish time allowed
Informal meetups with business colleagues, say we will meet in the lobby at Xish then +/- 5 minutes
Job Interview: interviewee: be there at least 5 min early or don’t bother. Hiring person : on time or you are a jerk
Meeting at an external job site requiring over an hours drive then +/- 10minutes, traffic happens

Life
Doing someone a favor for free, example being I’ll be there around 2 ish to change your car’s oil then +/-15 minutes.
Professional/medical appointment: you =on time or early, them = whenever they come get you unless you personally are paying big $ for their service time then say something the first time to let them know your time is valuable too. 2nd time fire them
I waited 3 hours at home yesterday for a FedEx delivery of a gun that I had to sign for.

Family
My wife : ish means + an hour, early has never happened.
 
For both of you traveling to meet, I think 5 minutes is the "ish" time, and any more than that needs a text.

If a buddy is coming over to my place to go fool around on the dirt bikes or snowmobiles, then the acceptable "ish" time gets longer, I'll go for a few laps or clean up the work bench. I have limited temporal awareness and my one buddy is even worse, the one day he was supposed to show up around 2ish, and at 2, I get a text asking if I have an ignition module for this particular sled... I didn't not, but he was trying to revive an older sled for his son at the last minute. He showed up at 3, I had almost cleaned up most of my workbench and we had a good time on the sleds that did run.
 
What ever "ish" means, it is not 1/2 hour after being 30 minutes late. I understand if someone is coming from 2 hours away, but that's just being rude taking advantage of your time. At least offer an ETA update as @The Critic suggested.

Last Saturday, driving 125 miles, I gave a "9 ish" update when I was 1/2 hour out. I got there at 8:55 I think. If I were not in a 500 HP car it would have been 9:10, maybe.
 
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"15 minutes is right. You have to take traffic into account" - the Little Guy.

I take a Jimmy Hoffa view here (like many of you). I'm early. When I use the term "ish" there is the strong possibility that I'm very early with little chance of being late at all.

1/2 and hour late is not "ish". Its being stood up.
 
In this situation, 15mins. Everybody has a phone now and I would kind of like a heads up. Luckily my friends and I communicate when we start heading over though, just in case an issue pops up during one of our travels.

In different situations, depends. If I use -ish to a non-planned event to a client, friends, etc, when I'm not in the area, usually that means +-15mins because of traffic and my obligations at that time.

If it's something like an interview, there is no ish unless an emergency happened.
 
crashz said:
"15 minutes is right. You have to take traffic into account" - the Little Guy.

I take a Jimmy Hoffa view here (like many of you). I'm early. When I use the term "ish" there is the strong possibility that I'm very early with little chance of being late at all.

1/2 and hour late is not "ish". Its being stood up.
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I’m the type to show up early as well. If it’s a very long distance that I have to travel I will often arrive a full hour early because I want to give myself a lot of extra leeway in case there is an accident on the way. When I’m doing my walking tours in Niagara Falls I always want to be there way before my guests arrive. I once had guests show up an hour earlier than the scheduled time but lucky for them I was there already! 😃
 
dogememe said:
I was supposed to meet someone at 8:30pm. At about 7:30 they messaged me that “it might be 9ish actually” so I showed up at 8:58pm. Well now it’s 9:26pm and they have yet to show up.

What is a reasonable amount of time to wait? I think I’m going to give up at 9:30.

Grok told me that most people mean within 15 minutes when they said “ish” on a time.

But what is your personal opinion?
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Depends on the culture I think.

Swiss, Korean, and Japanese: 9ish means 8:59 and before.
Chinese: probably before 9:30
California: probably before 9:10
Latin America: probably before 11:59
India: probably before the next day
South East Asia: probably before 3pm

Me: probably before 10am.
 
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