I often go to bed at 10 pm and wake up at 6 or 7am.
One day, I was sleeping when the phone rang at 11:30pm: Can I say the phone rang in the middle of the night in this case?
If not, then
Can I say "I was sleeping when the phone rang at the beginning of the night" when the phone rang at 11:30pm or 12am or even 12:30am?
Can I say "I was sleeping when the phone rang at the end of the night (or at the beginning of the morning)" when the phone rang at 5am, 5:30am, 6am, 6:30am?
When can I say the phone rang in the middle of the night?
For example, "when it rang at 12 am, 12:30am, 1am, 2am, 3am, 4am, 5 am, 6am"?
Best Answer
"In the middle of the night" doesn't have any fixed definition, but usually applies to times when you wouldn't expect anybody to be awake, so I'd say very roughly between 2 and 5 am.
The expression is also relative, so if you're an early riser, then someone phoning you at midnight is "in the middle of the night", even if teenagers are still awake.
There's no idiomatic equivalent expression with the "beginning/end" of the night/morning if you're asleep. To express those times, you'd have to say something like, "soon after I went to bed", "just before I usually wake up", "in the early morning", or "in the late morning".
The "beginning/end" of the night would refer to something like the beginning or end of a night out clubbing, or a night shift at work, or some other situation where you're awake all night and can perceive the beginning or end.