Time in San Francisco
United States · America/Los Angeles · latitude 37.77°
Reading your clock…
San Francisco changes its clocks twice a year
Standard time is UTC-08:00 and daylight saving time is UTC-07:00. The shift is 1 hour, and it is the reason the distance between San Francisco and anywhere else is not a single number.
| Date | Local time | Change | New offset |
|---|---|---|---|
| Sunday, 1 November 2026 | 02:00 → 01:00 | Back 60 min | UTC-08:00 |
| Sunday, 14 March 2027 | 02:00 → 03:00 | Forward 60 min | UTC-07:00 |
| Sunday, 7 November 2027 | 02:00 → 01:00 | Back 60 min | UTC-08:00 |
Same clock, different sky: Los Angeles, Seattle share America/Los_Angeles. Sunrise and sunset differ between them because latitude does, even though the clock does not.
Time difference from San Francisco
Where a range is shown, the gap genuinely changes during the year. That is not rounding or hedging — it is two governments moving their clocks on different weekends.
| City | Difference now | Across the year |
|---|---|---|
| London | 8 hours ahead | +7h / +8h |
| New York | 3 hours ahead | constant |
| Los Angeles | the same time | constant |
| Chicago | 2 hours ahead | constant |
| Toronto | 3 hours ahead | constant |
| Paris | 9 hours ahead | +8h / +9h |
| Berlin | 9 hours ahead | +8h / +9h |
| Dubai | 11 hours ahead | +11h / +12h |
| Mumbai | 12 hours 30 minutes ahead | +12h30 / +13h30 |
| Singapore | 15 hours ahead | +15h / +16h |
| Hong Kong | 15 hours ahead | +15h / +16h |
| Tokyo | 16 hours ahead | +16h / +17h |
| Sydney | 17 hours ahead | +17h / +18h / +19h |
| Auckland | 19 hours ahead | +19h / +20h / +21h |
| São Paulo | 4 hours ahead | +4h / +5h |
| UTC | 7 hours ahead | +7h / +8h |
Daylight in San Francisco through the year
From about 9.6 hours in December to 14.8 hours in June. This is the part a plain clock leaves out: 17:00 is a bright evening in one month and long dark in another.
| Month | Sunrise | Sunset | Daylight |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | 07:12 | 17:10 | 9h 58m |
| February | 06:45 | 17:45 | 11h 0m |
| March | 06:05 | 18:13 | 12h 8m |
| April | 05:19 | 18:40 | 13h 21m |
| May | 04:47 | 19:07 | 14h 20m |
| June | 04:38 | 19:25 | 14h 47m |
| July | 04:54 | 19:19 | 14h 25m |
| August | 05:20 | 18:47 | 13h 27m |
| September | 05:46 | 18:01 | 12h 15m |
| October | 06:13 | 17:16 | 11h 3m |
| November | 06:46 | 16:47 | 10h 1m |
| December | 07:12 | 16:45 | 9h 33m |
Daylight length is accurate. The clock times of sunrise and sunset assume each city sits at the centre of its time zone, which can put them up to about an hour and a quarter out for places near a zone's edge — Madrid being the standard example. Day length is unaffected.
Questions
About time in San Francisco
What time zone is San Francisco in?
San Francisco uses the IANA time zone America/Los_Angeles, which is UTC-08:00 in standard time and UTC-07:00 while daylight saving is in force. The same zone covers Los Angeles, Seattle.
Does San Francisco observe daylight saving time?
Yes. Clocks in San Francisco move by 1 hour, and the next change is on Sunday, 1 November 2026.
Why does the time difference to San Francisco keep changing?
Because the two places do not change their clocks on the same weekend, and in opposite hemispheres they change in opposite directions. London is a clear example: it sits 7 hours ahead, then 8 hours ahead across the year rather than one fixed distance.
How much daylight does San Francisco get?
Around 14.8 hours at the longest, in June, and about 9.6 hours at the shortest, in December. The table on this page lists sunrise and sunset through the year. Times are calculated from San Francisco's latitude of 37.77° and are approximate to within about an hour for cities that sit well away from the centre of their time zone.