Time Zone Converter
Free time zone converter and meeting planner. See one moment in local time across any number of cities, with daylight saving handled automatically.
During an autumn clock change, repeated times use the earlier occurrence.
The time you have
Daylight saving is applied automatically for the date you choose, using your browser's own time-zone database — so a meeting set for late March or late October lands on the right hour in every city, even when they change clocks on different weekends.
Scheduling across time zones is where remote work quietly falls apart. Someone proposes "2pm Tuesday", three people in three countries each read it differently, and one of them joins a call at four in the morning. Mental arithmetic is not the answer, because the offset between two cities is not constant — it changes several times a year, on different dates in each hemisphere.
This converter takes one moment and shows it as the local wall clock in every city you add, with the day shift marked and the hours colour-coded so an unworkable slot is obvious before you send the invitation.
How to use the Time Zone Converter
Set the time you have
Choose the city it is in, then the date and time. Your own zone and current time are filled in to start with.
Add the places you care about
Pick from the list and add as many as you need. They stay on screen together for comparison.
Read the results
Each row shows the local time, the local date, the UTC offset, and whether it falls on the next or previous day there.
Use the colours
Green is normal working hours, amber is awake but outside work, red is the middle of the night. If any row is red, move the meeting.
Why the offset between two cities keeps changing
London is five hours ahead of New York for most of the year — but for two weeks in March and one in early November it is four, because the two countries change their clocks on different dates. Anything scheduled in that window using a fixed offset is an hour wrong.
It gets worse across hemispheres. When Europe springs forward, Australia is falling back, so the gap between London and Sydney swings by two hours within a few weeks. And several places — India, most of Africa and Asia, Arizona, Queensland — do not change their clocks at all, so their relationship to everyone else shifts twice a year without them doing anything.
This is why the calculation here is done against the date you choose, using your browser's own copy of the IANA time zone database, rather than against a fixed offset table.
Time zone abbreviations are not reliable
Writing "3pm EST" in an email is ambiguous and often wrong. EST is Eastern *Standard* Time, which New York only observes in winter; for most of the year it is EDT. Meanwhile CST means Central Standard Time in North America, China Standard Time in Asia and Cuba Standard Time in the Caribbean — three different offsets sharing one abbreviation.
The unambiguous alternatives are UTC offsets ("15:00 UTC+5:30") or IANA zone identifiers ("Asia/Kolkata"), which is what this tool uses internally. In an invitation, the safest form is the city: "3pm New York time" cannot be misread.
Finding a workable window
| Pair of regions | Realistic overlap | Best slot |
|---|---|---|
| London ↔ New York | 4–5 hours | London afternoon / New York morning |
| London ↔ Colombo / Mumbai | 4–5 hours | London morning / South Asia afternoon |
| New York ↔ Bengaluru | About 1 hour | New York early morning / India evening |
| London ↔ Sydney | Almost none | London early morning / Sydney evening |
| San Francisco ↔ Berlin | 1–2 hours | San Francisco 8am / Berlin 5pm |
| Singapore ↔ Sydney | 6–7 hours | Any normal working hour |
When there is no overlap at all, rotate who takes the inconvenient hour rather than always imposing it on the same team.
Practical rules that prevent most mistakes
- Always name a city, never an abbreviation. "10am London time" is unambiguous; "10am GMT" is wrong for half the year.
- Send calendar invitations, not times in text. Every calendar application converts automatically for the recipient; an email does not.
- Check the date, not just the hour. A 9pm meeting in New York is already tomorrow in Singapore, and people miss meetings over this constantly.
- Watch the clock-change weeks. Late March and late October are when recurring meetings silently move for half the participants.
- Use UTC for anything logged. Servers, incident timelines and deployment records should be in UTC, which never changes.
Frequently asked questions
Does this handle daylight saving time?
Yes, automatically and for the specific date you choose — so a meeting set for late March or late October lands on the correct hour in every city, even though they change clocks on different weekends.
How many cities can I compare at once?
As many as you like. Add each one and they all stay on screen together, which is the point when you are scheduling across several offices.
Why does one city show a different date?
Because the moment falls on the next or previous calendar day there. The row is marked "next day" or "previous day" so it cannot be missed — this is the single most common scheduling error.
What is the difference between EST and EDT?
EST is Eastern Standard Time, used in winter; EDT is Eastern Daylight Time, used from March to November. Writing "EST" in summer is a common and confusing mistake — name the city instead.
Is my data sent anywhere?
No. The conversion uses the time zone database already built into your browser, so nothing is transmitted.
Can I plan a meeting for a future date?
Yes, and you should — pick the actual date so that any clock change between now and then is taken into account.
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Time Zone Converter is one of all the free tools on ToolNest. No account or subscription needed — anywhere in the world.