Which IANA name matches my city?

Search for the nearest large city in the same country and time zone. The IANA database uses `Continent/City` format. `America/Chicago` covers the entire US Central time zone. If your city is not listed, pick the one that follows the same DST rules.

What does UTC stand for?

Coordinated Universal Time. It replaced Greenwich Mean Time as the primary reference in 1972. Aviation, shipping, the internet, and most computer systems run on UTC. For everyday conversion, UTC and GMT are effectively the same.

Why does the converter show a different offset than my phone?

Your phone probably runs an older version of the IANA database. Countries change their time zones with little warning. A newer offset on the converter usually means a more recent update. Check the date of the change against an official government source.

Can I convert dates before 1970?

Yes. The IANA database includes time zone rules back to the 1800s for most locations. Accuracy depends on the completeness of historical records. Some zones have gaps before the 20th century.

What does "AoE" mean in a deadline?

Anywhere on Earth. It refers to UTC-12, the latest time zone, based on Baker Island and Howland Island. Academic conferences and grant applications use AoE to give every submitter until the last possible moment on the deadline day.

Time Zone Converter

Which city do I type into a time zone converter?

Type two locations. The converter returns the current time in both, the live offset, and an hour-by-hour table you can scan for whole-workday overlap.

Never type "EST." That label points to three different offsets. UTC-5 in the US. UTC+10 in Australia. UTC+3 in parts of Eastern Europe during summer. The tool uses IANA time zone names such as America/New_York or Australia/Sydney. A name tied to a city tells the converter exactly which rules to apply, on which dates, going back decades.

Skip the abbreviation. Pick the city.

Why does my time zone converter show a different offset in July?

An offset like UTC-5 is not permanent. It flips when a location enters or leaves daylight saving time.

New York runs on UTC-5 in winter. It shifts to UTC-4 in summer. London moves from UTC+0 to UTC+1. Convert a meeting in January and you get the winter offset. Convert the same meeting in July and you get the summer one. Daylight Saving Time around the world lists which countries change and when.

The offset the converter displays is the one in effect for the date you selected. Clocks jump forward or back at a specific hour. On the Sunday of a spring-forward transition, 2:30am does not exist. The converter skips it. That is the rule, not a bug.

Will next week's 10am call land at the same UTC moment?

Probably not, if one of your zones changes clocks in between.

Enter 10am on a Monday. The converter gives you the correct UTC equivalent. Enter 10am on the following Monday. The answer shifts if a DST boundary fell during that week.

Recurring meeting invitations break for exactly this reason. A March meeting set for 10am Eastern Time lands at 2pm UTC. After the US springs forward, the same invitation lands at 3pm UTC. The converter shows what actually happens, not what the calendar guessed when you created the event.

Can a time zone converter handle dates in the past?

Set any date in the tool. The offset updates to the rules that were in effect on that day.

This matters because governments rewrite the rules. Samoa erased 30 December 2011 from its calendar, jumping from UTC-11 to UTC+13. Kiribati moved the date line in 1995. Venezuela shifted its offset twice between 2007 and 2016. The IANA database tracks every change, and the converter pulls from that data.

For dates more than six months out, check back closer to the time. Governments reverse decisions on short notice. Russia ran on permanent DST from 2011 to 2014, then dropped it. Mexico abolished DST nationally in 2022, keeping it only for a strip of border municipalities. Ukraine moved to permanent standard time in 2024. The converter updates when the IANA database does. Your calendar app might lag.

Mistakes that produce the wrong meeting time

Typing an abbreviation instead of a city. "IST" means India (UTC+5:30), Ireland in summer (UTC+1), and Israel (UTC+2 in winter, UTC+3 in summer). Time zone abbreviations are ambiguous. Always pick a city or an IANA name.

Omitting the date. A conversion without a date is a guess. 10am in Los Angeles is 6pm in London in winter. It is 5pm in London in summer. The time alone is not enough.

Assuming every offset is a whole hour. Nepal runs on UTC+5:45. Newfoundland runs on UTC-3:30. The full list of UTC offsets spans UTC-12 to UTC+14 and includes quarter-hour and half-hour zones.

Trusting a phone world clock for a trip next year. Phone clocks update when the operating system receives a new IANA data release. If you book travel six months ahead, the phone may lack the latest rule change. Use a tool that pulls live data.