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North American time zones:

CST – Central Standard Time

Current time in Mexico City

Sunday, December 2, 2012 at 8:40:19 PM CST

Mexico City will stay on CST until Sunday, April 7, 2013 at 2:00 AM
when clocks are moved to Sunday, April 7, 2013 at 03:00:00CDT

Find local time and time zone for a location

We recommend looking up by location name, not time zone name.

Time zone offset: UTC - 6 hours

CST is 6 hours behind of Coordinated Universal Time (UTC)

Note that most places observe daylight saving time/summer time during summer, and are therefore using CDT instead in the summer. See below for details.

Time zone abbreviations: CST, HNC

Full name is Central Standard Time
HNC – Heure Normale du Centre (French)
CST – Tiempo Central Estándar (Spanish)

Email time zone indicator: -0600

An email sent from someone in the CST time zone will have the time zone listed as "-0600" in the headers of the email. (However, "-0600" does not have to be in CST, as other time zones could have the same UTC offset).

For actual dates DST might be observed, look at the examples below

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Where and when is CST observed?

US states using CST in the winter and CDT during the summer

Alabama
Arkansas
Florida - North-West parts
Bay, Calhoun, Escambia, Holmes, Jackson, Okaloosa, Santa Rosa, Walton and Washington counties and norther Gulf county
Illinois
Indiana - these few north-western counties near Chicago (Lake, Porter, La Porte, Newton, Jasper, Starke) and these south-western counties in Indiana near Evansville
Gibson, Posey, Vanderburgh, Warrick, Perry
Iowa
Kansas - except these western counties
Greeley, Hamilton, Sherman and Wallace - MST/MDT
Kentucky - Western part
Adair, Allen, Ballard, Barren, Breckinridge, Butler, Caldwell, Calloway, Carlisle, Christian, Clinton, Crittenden, Cumberland, Daviess, Edmonson, Fulton, Graves, Grayson, Green, Hansock, Hart, Henderson, Hickman, Hopkins, Livingston, Logan, Lyon, Marshall, McCracken, McLean, Metcalfe, Monroe, Muhlenberg, Ohio, Russell, Simpson, Todd, Trigg, Union, Warren and Webster counties
Louisiana
Michigan - A few western counties
Dickinson, Gogebic, Iron, and Menominee
Minnesota
Mississippi
Missouri
Nebraska - Eastern parts
All except Arthur, Banner, Box Butte, Chase, Cheyenne, Dawes, Deuel, Dundy, Garden, Grant, Hooker, Keith, Kimball, Morrill, Perkins, Scotts Bluff, Sheridan, and Sioux counties and the western part of Cherry county which are on MST/MDT
North Dakota - North and Eastern parts
counties of Barnes, Benson, Bottineau, Burke, Burleigh, Cass, Cavalier, Dickey, Divide, Eddy, Emmons, Foster, Grand Forks, Griggs, Kidder, Lamoure, Logan, McHenry, McIntosh, McLean, Mountrail, Nelson, Oliver, Pembina, Pierce, Ramsey, Ransom, Renville, Richland, Rolette, Sargent, Sheridan, Steele, Stutsman, Towner, Traill, Walsh, Ward, Wells, Williams and northern parts of McKenzie and Dunn, westernmost part of Morton and Fort Yates in Sioux
Oklahoma
South Dakota - Eastern parts
counties of Aurora, Beadle, Bon Homme, Brookings, Brown, Brule, Buffalo, Campbell, Charles Mix, Clark, Clay, Codington, Davison, Day, Deuel, Douglas, Edmunds, Faulk, Grant, Gregory, Hamlin, Hand, Hanson, Hughes, Hutchinson, Hyde, Jerauld, Kingsbury, Lake, Lincoln, Lyman, Marshall, McCook, McPherson, Miner, Minnehaha, Moody, Potter, Roberts, Spink, Sanborn, Sully, Tripp, Turner, Union, Yankton, Walworth and eastern parts of Jones and Stanley
Tennessee - Western part
counties of Bedford, Benton, Bledsoe, Cannon, Carroll, Cheatham, Chester, Clay, Coffee, Crockett, Cumberland, Davidson, Decatur, DeKalb, Dickson, Dyer, Fayette, Fentress, Franklin, Gibson, Giles, Grundy, Hardeman, Hardin, Haywood, Henderson, Henry, Hickman, Houston, Humphreys, Jackson, Lake, Lauderdale, Lawrence, Lewis, Lincoln, McNairy, Macon, Madison, Marion, Marshall, Maury, Montgomery, Moore, Obion, Overton, Perry, Pickett, Putnam, Robertson, Rutherford, Sequatchie, Shelby, Smith, Stewart, Sumner, Tipton, Trusdale, Van Buren, Warren, Wayne Weakley, White, Willamson, Wilson
Texas - All, but a few counties in west
El Paso and Hudspeth and part of Culberson
Wisconsin

Canadian provinces using CST in the winter and CDT during the summer

Manitoba
Nunavut - Kugluktuk, Cambridge Bay only (Other parts use EST/EDT or EST only)
Ontario - most parts west of 90 West. (Parts east of 90 West is on EST/EDT)
Saskatchewan - only Creighton and Denare Beach

Canadian provinces using CST all year

Ontario - a few communities
Atikokan, New Osnaburgh, Pickle Lake
Saskatchewan - most of it
except Creighton and Denare Beach which use CDT during summer, and Lloydminster which is in the MST/MDT zone

Mexican states using CST in the winter and CDT during the summer

Aguascalientes
Campeche
Chiapas
Coahuila
Colima
Distrito Federal
Durango
Guanajuato
Guerro
Hidalgo
Jalisco
León
Michoacán
Morelos
México
Nuevo León
Oaxaca
Puebla
Querétaro
Quintana Roo
San Luis Potosí
Tabasco
Tamaulipas
Tlaxcala
Veracruz
Yucatán
Zacatecas

Time zone maps are under development and will be available later

Example locations in CST

Regina - This time zone offset is used all year in this location
Mexico City - This time zone offset is used during winter in this location

Other time zones in North America

Go directly through the links below, or see the North America time zone list

ADT - Atlantic Daylight Time
AKDT - Alaska Daylight Time
AKST - Alaska Standard Time
AST - Atlantic Standard Time
CDT - Central Daylight Time
EDT - Eastern Daylight Time
EGST - Eastern Greenland Summer Time
EGT - East Greenland Time
EST - Eastern Standard Time
HADT - Hawaii-Aleutian Daylight Time
HAST - Hawaii-Aleutian Standard Time
MDT - Mountain Daylight Time
MST - Mountain Standard Time
NDT - Newfoundland Daylight Time
NST - Newfoundland Standard Time
PDT - Pacific Daylight Time
PMDT - Pierre & Miquelon Daylight Time
PMST - Pierre & Miquelon Standard Time
PST - Pacific Standard Time
WGST - Western Greenland Summer Time
WGT - West Greenland Time