Time in Japan, live from Tokyo.

The time in Japan is Japan Standard Time, JST, which is UTC+9. All of Japan uses this one clock, and the country does not use daylight saving time, so the clock stays at UTC+9 all year. The big clock above shows Tokyo time to the second from your device clock, with the date, and the cards give the offset and your gap to Japan right now.

How to use this Japan time page

1. Read the big clock: hours, minutes and seconds in Japan, then the date, the name of the zone and its UTC offset.
2. The cards under it show the time zone, the UTC offset, whether the place changes its clocks and when next, and the difference from your own time zone. If the page has guessed your zone wrong, pick the right one under Your place.
3. To plan a call, set a Date and a Time under What time is it there when it is. The line under the boxes gives the time in Japan, with the day. Use now sets your own current time.
4. The row of eight times below shows common hours of your day, every three hours, next to the matching time there.
5. On the right, tick 24-hour clock or switch Show seconds off. Copy the time copies one line you can paste into a message. Your choices stay in this browser.

What the official sources say

The National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, NICT, is the body in charge of distributing and maintaining Japan Standard Time. The IANA time zone database lists Asia/Tokyo at UTC+9, and the only daylight saving rules it records for Japan are the ones from 1948 to 1951. The page reads the current rules from your browser, so it shows no clock change for Japan in the next two years. Checked 18 Oct 2026.

Japan is a day ahead of the Americas

Japan is far east, so its date changes before the US date does. It is 13 hours ahead of New York on EDT, 14 on EST, 16 ahead of Los Angeles on PDT and 17 on PST. When Tokyo starts Tuesday morning, the US is still on Monday. Here is 9:00 AM Tuesday 20 October 2026 in Tokyo on three clocks:

Take New York: 9:00 AM JST is midnight UTC (subtract 9 hours). New York is on EDT, 4 hours behind UTC, so it is 8:00 PM the day before. That is why a Monday morning meeting in Japan is a Sunday evening one in the US.

Japan compared with other places

Seoul shares UTC+9, so there is no gap and no change. Sydney moves the other way: its summer is our winter, so the gap with Japan is 2 hours in January and 1 hour in July. For New York, Los Angeles and London the gap changes when they move their clocks.

Planning a call with Japan

The best overlap with the US is the US evening and the Japanese morning. 8:00 PM on the US East coast in summer is 9:00 AM the next day in Japan. With Europe, the European morning is the Japanese late afternoon: 9:00 AM London time in winter is 6:00 PM in Tokyo. Use the box above to get exact answers for a date, including the day.

Reading the date as well as the time

The result line above carries the date of the answer, with Tuesday, Wednesday and so on. Check it for every call across this gap, because a time that fits on one calendar may land on the next day for someone else.

Common mistakes with Japan time

Three mistakes come up. The first is forgetting the date: a Monday morning in Japan is a Sunday evening in the US. The second is assuming Japan has a summer time, as the US and Europe do. It does not, so the gap with the US changes in March and November because of the US, not Japan. The third is adding a half hour from habit: Japan's offset is a whole 9 hours, so there is no half hour here, unlike India. If an answer looks off, read the day written next to it.

Is the clock exact?

The page shows your device clock converted to Japan time. If the device clock is a few seconds off, so is the page. The online clock has a Check my clock button that compares your device with the web server.

Sources, checked 18 Oct 2026. NICT, Japan Standard Time; the IANA time zone database (version 2026e).

Related: time in Korea, time in Hawaii and the time zone converter.