China Time Now

What this page shows

So you want to know what time it is in China right now. Maybe you have a call with someone there, a flight to catch, a market open to track, or someone to reach before their evening is over. That is what the clock at the top of this page is for. It shows the current time in China and ticks forward every second, so there is nothing for you to work out by hand.

China keeps a single time zone across the entire country, so this one clock is good everywhere, from Shanghai on the coast to the far western regions. Wherever in the world you are reading from, it keeps itself right on its own, and it is simple, because China time never changes through the year.

China does not change its clocks

Here is the part worth knowing about China time, and it makes things easy. China does not use daylight saving. There is no spring forward and no fall back, so the country stays on the same clock all year round, China Standard Time, eight hours ahead of UTC.

China did try daylight saving for a few years in the late 1980s, but it was dropped in the early 1990s and has never returned. So there are no change dates to track. Whenever you look, China is at UTC plus 8, and the clock above simply shows that time.

What time zone China is in

China runs on China Standard Time, eight hours ahead of UTC, held every day of the year, and here is the remarkable part: the whole country uses it. China is wide enough to span around five geographic time zones, yet it keeps just one, set to the time of the east, where Beijing and Shanghai sit. The clock is often simply called Beijing time.

In the east, where most people live, this fits the sun well. But in the far west, in regions like Xinjiang, the official clock runs hours ahead of the sun, so the sun can be at its highest in the middle of what the clock calls the afternoon. To cope, many people in the west informally keep an unofficial local time, roughly two hours behind the national clock, for everyday life, even though the official time everywhere is the same UTC plus 8.

Time difference from China to other places

China never changes its clocks, so the gap to other fixed-offset places stays the same all year. The places that do use daylight saving, like London and New York, shift by an hour against China between their winter and summer. Here is the quick reference, assuming it is 12 noon in China.

A few quick examples

Let us run a few, so you can see how this works.

Say it is 12 noon in China. Tokyo and Seoul are an hour ahead at 1 in the afternoon, while Singapore reads the same, 12 noon, since it shares the offset. Mumbai is two and a half hours behind at 9:30 in the morning.

Now the long hauls west. In the winter, London is eight hours behind China, so 12 noon here is 4 in the morning in London, and New York, thirteen hours behind, is still at 11 the previous evening. Midday in China lands in the small hours across Europe and the Americas.

Because those places use daylight saving and China does not, the gap shifts by an hour in their summer. London moves to seven hours behind and New York to twelve. So for a call that has to land just right, check the live clock rather than the rule of thumb.

A couple of things about China time

Because China keeps one clock across such a wide country, daylight falls very differently from east to west. In the east, around Beijing at about 40 degrees north, the day runs from roughly fifteen hours in summer to a little over nine in winter, with the clock and the sun reasonably in step. Far to the west, the same clock times the day quite differently against the sun, so sunrise and sunset land at hours that would look very late to an eastern eye.

This is the trade China makes for the simplicity of a single national time. Everyone shares the same hour, which makes scheduling across the country effortless, at the cost of the clock drifting well away from the sun the further west you go. The unofficial local time used in parts of the west is a quiet, everyday way of bridging that gap.

Other places on the same time

A few places keep the same time as China, or close to it. Here are some to jump to:

• Beijing time now, the capital
• Singapore time now, on the same offset
• Tokyo time now, an hour ahead

And if it is the global reference China is measured from that you are after, see UTC Time Now.

Questions people ask

What time is it in China right now?

The clock near the top of this page is the answer, and it updates every second. China keeps one time zone and does not use daylight saving, so the time shown is always correct, anywhere in the country.

Does China use daylight saving time?

No. China tried it for a few years in the late 1980s and dropped it in the early 1990s. The country has stayed on China Standard Time, UTC plus 8, ever since, with no seasonal change.

Does all of China really have the same time?

Officially, yes. The entire country runs on China Standard Time at UTC plus 8, even though it is wide enough to span around five geographic zones. In the far west, many people informally keep a local time about two hours behind for daily life, but the official clock is the same everywhere.

What time zone is China in?

China Standard Time, eight hours ahead of UTC, held all year, and used across the whole country. It is often called Beijing time.

What is the time difference between China and New York?

New York is normally thirteen hours behind China, or twelve when New York is on summer time. The gap shifts because New York uses daylight saving and China does not.

What is the IANA name for China time?

It is Asia/Shanghai in the IANA time zone database, the time data your phone and your computer use. That single identifier covers the whole country, and it is what drives the live clock on this page.

References

1. Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA). Time Zone Database (the tz database), home of the Asia/Shanghai identifier used across China. https://www.iana.org/time-zones
2. National Time Service Center (NTSC), Chinese Academy of Sciences, which generates and keeps China's standard time. https://www.ntsc.ac.cn
3. Bureau International des Poids et Mesures (BIPM), Time Department, which maintains Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), the reference China Standard Time is measured from. https://www.bipm.org/en/work-programme/time