CST
Central Standard Time
GMT -6
12am
3am
6am
9am
12pm
3pm
6pm
9pm
UTC
Universal Time Coordinated
GMT +0
12am
3am
6am
9am
12pm
3pm
6pm
9pm

Quick answers

CST is 6 hours behind UTC. CST uses GMT -6, and UTC uses GMT +0 for this comparison.

For example, 6:00 am CST is 12:00 pm UTC. Use the converter above to adjust the date or time and create a shareable meeting link.

Best meeting overlap: 9am-11am CST, which is 3pm-5pm UTC.

CST is a fixed UTC-6 standard-time offset. For current Central Time, compare CDT to UTC or CT to UTC.

Compare CST time with UTC time, including current local time, UTC offsets, time difference, daylight saving changes, working hours, and shareable meeting times.

Time Difference

Central Standard Time is 6 hours behind Universal Time Coordinated
6:00 am06:00 in CST is 12:00 pm12:00 in UTC

CST to UTC call time
Best time for a conference call or a meeting is between 9am-11am in CST which corresponds to 3pm-5pm in UTC

6:00 am06:00 Central Standard Time (CST). Offset UTC -6:00 hours
12:00 pm12:00 Universal Time Coordinated (UTC). Offset UTC 0:00 hours

6:00 am06:00 CST / 12:00 pm12:00 UTC

CSTUTC
12am (midnight)6am
1am7am
2am8am
3am9am
4am10am
5am11am
6am12pm (noon)
7am1pm
8am2pm
9am3pm
10am4pm
11am5pm
12pm (noon)6pm
1pm7pm
2pm8pm
3pm9pm
4pm10pm
5pm11pm
6pm12am (midnight)
7pm1am
8pm2am
9pm3am
10pm4am
11pm5am
00:0006:00
01:0007:00
02:0008:00
03:0009:00
04:0010:00
05:0011:00
06:0012:00
07:0013:00
08:0014:00
09:0015:00
10:0016:00
11:0017:00
12:0018:00
13:0019:00
14:0020:00
15:0021:00
16:0022:00
17:0023:00
18:0000:00
19:0001:00
20:0002:00
21:0003:00
22:0004:00
23:0005:00

Central Standard Time

Offset: CST is 6 hours behind Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) and is used in North America

Countries using this time zone: Belize, Canada, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, El Salvador, United States

Principal Cities: The largest city in the CST time zone is Mexico City in Mexico, with about 12.294 million people. Other major cities in this time zone include Chicago, Houston, Iztapalapa, Ecatepec.

French: HNC - Heure Normale du Centre

Spanish: CT - Tiempo Central Estándar, CT - Zona Centro

CST Time Zone Geo Map
CST timezone map

Daylight Saving: This is a standard time zone. During summer, some places set clocks forward one hour for daylight saving time and observe Central Daylight Time (CDT).

Daylight saving time clock moves back for one hour from 2am to 1amStart: Central Standard Time (CST) started on Sunday, November 2, 2025 at 2:00 am local time and clocks were set one hour back to Sunday, November 2, 2025, 1:00 am. Standard time starts annually on the first Sunday of November.

Daylight saving time clock moves forward for one hour from 2am to 3amEnd: Central Standard Time (CST) ends on Sunday, March 8, 2026 at 2:00 am local time and clocks are set one hour forward to Sunday, March 8, 2026, 3:00 am local daylight time instead. Standard time ends annually on the second Sunday of March.

CST representations, usage and related time zones

W3C/ISO-8601: International standard covering representation and exchange of dates and time-related data
  • -06 - basic short
  • -0600 - basic
  • -06:00 - extended
Email/RFC-2822: Internet Message Format Date Standard, typically used for timestamps in email headers
  • -0600 - sign character (-) followed by a four digit time providing hours (06) and minutes (00) of the offset. Indicates an offset of six hours to the west of the zero meridian.
Military/NATO: Used by the U.S. military, Chinese military and others
  • Sierra - Military abbreviation for CST
  • S - short form of 'Sierra'
IANA/Olson: Reflects CST time zone boundaries defined by political bodies, primarily intended for use with computer programs and operating systems
  • America/Bahia_Banderas
  • America/Belize
  • America/Chicago
  • America/Chihuahua
  • America/Costa_Rica
  • America/El_Salvador
  • America/Guatemala
  • America/Indiana/Knox
  • America/Indiana/Tell_City
  • America/Knox_IN
  • America/Managua
  • America/Matamoros
  • America/Menominee
  • America/Merida
  • America/Mexico_City
  • America/Monterrey
  • America/North_Dakota/Beulah
  • America/North_Dakota/Center
  • America/North_Dakota/New_Salem
  • America/Ojinaga
  • America/Rainy_River
  • America/Rankin_Inlet
  • America/Regina
  • America/Resolute
  • America/Swift_Current
  • America/Tegucigalpa
  • America/Winnipeg
  • CST6CDT
  • Canada/Central
  • Canada/Saskatchewan
  • Mexico/General
  • US/Central
  • US/Indiana-Starke
CST Abbreviation: Several time zones share CST abbreviation and it could refer to these time zones
  • Central Standard Time - UTC -6
  • China Standard Time - UTC +8
  • Cuba Standard Time - UTC -5
Time zones with the GMT -6 offset:
  • CST - Central Standard Time
  • CT - Central Time
  • MDT - Mountain Daylight Time
  • EAST - Easter Island Standard Time
  • GALT - Galapagos Time
  • S - Sierra Time Zone

Universal Time Coordinated

Offset: UTC is 0 hours ahead Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) and is used in Universal

Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) is the world time standard that regulates clocks and time. It is successor to Greenwich Mean Time (GMT). For casual use, UTC is the same as GMT, but is used by the scientific community.
UTC is the time standard commonly used across the world since 1972. It is used in many technical fields, like aviation industry and meteorologists, also used to synchronize time across internet networks.

UTC representations, usage and related time zones

W3C/ISO-8601: International standard covering representation and exchange of dates and time-related data
  • Z - is the zone designator for the zero UTC/GMT offset, also known as 'Zulu' time
  • +00 - basic short
  • +0000 - basic
  • +00:00 - extended
Email/RFC-2822: Internet Message Format Date Standard, typically used for timestamps in email headers
  • +0000 - sign character (+) followed by a four digit time providing hours (00) and minutes (00) of the offset. Indicates the zero UTC/GMT offset.
Military/NATO: Used by the U.S. military, Chinese military and others
  • Zulu - Military abbreviation for UTC
  • Z - short form of 'Zulu'
IANA/Olson: Reflects UTC time zone boundaries defined by political bodies, primarily intended for use with computer programs and operating systems
  • Etc/UCT
  • Etc/UTC
  • Etc/Universal
  • Etc/Zulu
  • UCT
  • UTC
  • Universal
  • Zulu
Time zones with the GMT +0 offset:
  • EGST - Eastern Greenland Summer Time
  • GMT - Greenwich Mean Time
  • WET - Western European Time
  • AZOST - Azores Summer Time
  • UTC - Universal Time Coordinated
  • WT - Western Sahara Standard Time
  • Z - Zulu Time Zone