Current time in Honolulu

The islands used a half-hour offset, UTC−10:30, for decades. In June 1947 the territory moved to a whole-hour UTC−10, the clock still used today. Wartime time ended in 1945, and when the Uniform Time Act of 1966 set national rules for daylight saving, Hawaii used the law's opt-out. Close to the tropics, day length barely changes, so shifting an hour in summer would bring little benefit.

Because the mainland moves its clocks and Hawaii does not, the gap changes twice a year. From the second Sunday of March to the first Sunday of November, Honolulu is three hours behind Los Angeles and six behind New York. In the mainland winter the gaps shrink to two and five hours.

At 21° north, Honolulu's day ranges from about 10 hours 50 minutes in December to about 13 hours 25 minutes in June. Summer sunrise comes near 5:50 AM with sunset around 7:15 PM; in December the sun rises around 7:05 AM and sets just before 6:00 PM. Surfers watching the dawn on the North Shore in winter wait for a sunrise more than an hour later than in summer.

The New York Stock Exchange opens at 9:30 AM Eastern, which is 3:30 AM in Honolulu while the mainland is on daylight time and 4:30 AM in winter; the close at 4:00 PM Eastern lands at 10:00 or 11:00 AM. Remote workers on East Coast teams often start before dawn. Toward Asia, Tokyo is 19 hours ahead, so a Honolulu afternoon is the following morning in Japan. The HST to PST page shows each hour against California, and the world clock puts Honolulu beside other cities.