Beijing Time Now

Although China may be spanning five geographical time zones, it follows a single standard time set of eight hours ahead of the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC +08:00). Beijing Local Mean Solar Time was adopted as the official time standard by the Republic of China government from 1914. The Central Observatory of Beiyang Government proposed five standard time zones by 1918. These include Changpai (UTC +08:30), Chungyuan (UTC +08:00), Kansu-Szechwan (UTC +07:00), Sinkiang-Tibet (UTC +06:00) and Kunlun (UTC + 05:30). Most of the inner regions of China adopted their own time standards in the 1930s because the proposed five time zones had not been observed fully.

Most of the regional governments switched to using a similar time as Beijing after the end of Chinese Civil War recognized as GMT +8. It was later known as China Standard Time or the Beijing Time. Macau and Hong Kong were established as special administrative regions after being transferred to Chins from Portugal and United Kingdom. The sovereignty of SARs still retains their individual policies concerning time zones for historical reasons despite the fact that they belong to China. Both are within the time zone UTC +08:00 due to their geographical locations and it is the same as the national standard Beijing time.