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Africa/Ceuta time zone

6:02PMCET

CETUTC+1+6 h vs New York (you)

About Africa/Ceuta

Africa/Ceuta is the IANA time zone for Ceuta, Melilla in Spain. It currently keeps Central European Standard Time (CET, UTC+1) in winter and Central European Summer Time (CEST, UTC+2) in summer.

Its principal location is Ceuta at 35.88° N, 5.32° W.

Abbreviations in use: CET, CEST. Offset page: UTC+1.

Rule for future years (POSIX TZ string)

CET-1CEST,M3.5.0,M10.5.0/3

The standard time is called CET and is UTC+1. POSIX writes the offset with the opposite sign (west of Greenwich is positive), which is why the string says "-1". Daylight saving time is called CEST and is UTC+2. It starts on the last Sunday of March at 02:00 and ends on the last Sunday of October at 03:00, local time. Software that has no full tzdata copy, such as many embedded devices, can use this string directly as the TZ environment variable.

Upcoming transitions

Computed from tzdata 2026f; local times are read on the clock just before each change.

History of Africa/Ceuta since 1970

The record starts with local mean time (UTC−0:21), which ended on December 31, 1900. The first daylight saving time in the record is in 1918.

YearsClocksAbbreviations
1970–1973UTC+0 all yearWET
1974UTC+0 in winter, UTC+1 in summerWET, WEST
1975UTC+0 all yearWET
1976–1978UTC+0 in winter, UTC+1 in summerWET, WEST
1979–1983UTC+0 all yearWET
1984UTC+0 until March 16, then UTC+1WET, CET
1985UTC+1 all yearCET
1986 onwardUTC+1 in winter, UTC+2 in summerCET, CEST

Before 1970

13 offset changes before 1970 in the record:

Changes of the winter (standard) offset: Friday, March 16, 1984, UTC+0 → UTC+1.

tzdata commits to accuracy from 1970 for every zone (zone1970.tab); earlier entries are historical research and may be incomplete.

Aliases and zones with the same clock

Other zones that keep exactly the same time under the current rules (but have a different history): Europe/Andorra, Europe/Belgrade, Europe/Berlin, Europe/Brussels, Europe/Budapest, Europe/Gibraltar, Europe/Madrid, Europe/Malta, Europe/Paris, Europe/Prague, Europe/Rome, Europe/Tirane.

Convert Ceuta time

Tip: Alt+↑/↓ steps the time by 15 minutes (Shift: one hour). The link keeps the date, time and direction.

Using Africa/Ceuta in code

Every major platform reads the same IANA ID. Store instants in UTC and convert with the ID at display time; never store a fixed offset for a place that has daylight saving time.

// JavaScript
new Date().toLocaleString('en-US', { timeZone: 'Africa/Ceuta' })

# Python 3.9+
from zoneinfo import ZoneInfo
from datetime import datetime
datetime.now(ZoneInfo('Africa/Ceuta'))

// Java
java.time.ZonedDateTime.now(java.time.ZoneId.of("Africa/Ceuta"))

// Go
loc, _ := time.LoadLocation("Africa/Ceuta")
time.Now().In(loc)

-- PostgreSQL
SELECT now() AT TIME ZONE 'Africa/Ceuta';

# Shell
TZ='Africa/Ceuta' date

Platforms ship their own copy of tzdata and update it on their own schedule. After a rule change, outputs can differ until the platform updates; this page uses tzdata 2026f.

Questions

What is the UTC offset of Africa/Ceuta?
UTC+1 in winter and UTC+2 in summer (daylight saving time from the last Sunday of March at 2:00 AM to the last Sunday of October at 3:00 AM).
Does Africa/Ceuta observe daylight saving time?
Yes: clocks move one hour forward on the last Sunday of March at 2:00 AM and back on the last Sunday of October at 3:00 AM.
Which countries use Africa/Ceuta?
Spain, according to zone1970.tab in tzdata.

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