Midnight moves around the planet
New Year doesn't happen once. It rolls across the globe for about 26 hours, one time zone at a time. Kiribati's Line Islands, at UTC+14, get 2027 first, at 10:00 UTC on December 31. The last inhabited places, like American Samoa at UTC−11, ring it in 25 hours later. (Uninhabited Baker Island, at UTC−12, technically goes last.) The countdown above uses your own device's clock.
When it's midnight where
| Place | Offset | Midnight in UTC |
|---|---|---|
| Kiribati (Line Islands) | UTC+14 | Dec 31, 10:00 UTC |
| New Zealand (Auckland) | UTC+13 | Dec 31, 11:00 UTC |
| Australia (Sydney) | UTC+11 | Dec 31, 13:00 UTC |
| Japan / South Korea | UTC+9 | Dec 31, 15:00 UTC |
| China / Singapore | UTC+8 | Dec 31, 16:00 UTC |
| India | UTC+5.5 | Dec 31, 18:30 UTC |
| UAE | UTC+4 | Dec 31, 20:00 UTC |
| Turkey / Moscow | UTC+3 | Dec 31, 21:00 UTC |
| Germany / France | UTC+1 | Dec 31, 23:00 UTC |
| UK / Portugal | UTC+0 | Jan 1, 00:00 UTC |
| Brazil (São Paulo) | UTC−3 | Jan 1, 03:00 UTC |
| New York | UTC−5 | Jan 1, 05:00 UTC |
| Mexico City | UTC−6 | Jan 1, 06:00 UTC |
| Los Angeles | UTC−8 | Jan 1, 08:00 UTC |
| Hawaii | UTC−10 | Jan 1, 10:00 UTC |
| American Samoa | UTC−11 | Jan 1, 11:00 UTC |
Half-hour zones like India (UTC+5:30) and quarter-hour zones like Nepal (UTC+5:45) mean the celebrations don't line up neatly on the hour. And since it's winter in the north, none of these places are on daylight saving time except the Southern Hemisphere ones, like Sydney and Auckland.
Calling family abroad?
If you're in New York and want to call someone in Germany at their midnight, dial at 6 p.m. on New Year's Eve. For Sydney, it's 8 a.m. Eastern on December 31. My trick: celebrate a 'European midnight' at 6 p.m. with the kids, then send them to bed. They never know.
Famous celebrations
Sydney Harbour's fireworks are among the first big shows on TV. Then come Dubai's Burj Khalifa, London's Thames fireworks, and Times Square's ball drop. See our New Year's Eve countdown and days left in 2026.