How To Change the TimeZone on Ubuntu 25.10

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In this wiki article, We will learn how to change the Timezone on Ubuntu 25.10 using the timedatectl command.

Check your Current TimeZone

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To get detailed information on your Ubuntu date, time, and timezone, use the timedatectl command.

timedatectl

Output:

root@server:~# timedatectl
               Local time: Sat 2025-10-11 20:04:56 UTC
           Universal time: Sat 2025-10-11 20:04:56 UTC
                 RTC time: Sat 2025-10-11 20:04:56
                Time zone: Etc/UTC (UTC, +0000)
System clock synchronized: yes
              NTP service: active
          RTC in local TZ: no

The TimeZone configuration on Ubuntu OS is stored and set by the /etc/localtime file.
This file is a symbolic link to a timezone file under /usr/share/zoneinfo.

To get a basic view of the timezone, you can list the file to see its symbolic link.

ls -l /etc/localtime

Output:

root@server:~# ls -l /etc/localtime
lrwxrwxrwx 1 root root 27 Oct 11 20:05 /etc/localtime -> /usr/share/zoneinfo/Etc/UTC

The system’s timezone is also written to the /etc/timezone file.

cat /etc/timezone

Output:

root@server:~# cat /etc/timezone
Etc/UTC

Listing TimeZones

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Use the list-timezones option to list available timezones.
You can later use one of these to set as your preferred timezone.

timedatectl list-timezones

Output:

root@server:~# timedatectl list-timezones
Africa/Abidjan
Africa/Accra
Africa/Addis_Ababa
Africa/Algiers
Africa/Asmara
Africa/Asmera
.
.
.

Set your Preferred TimeZone

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Once you have the list of timezones, you can set the one you prefer.

timedatectl set-timezone your_time_zone

Example:

root@ubuntu:~# timedatectl set-timezone America/New_York

Confirm your changes were applied by running the timedatectl command again.

timedatectl

Output:

root@server:~# timedatectl
               Local time: Sat 2025-10-11 16:06:35 EDT
           Universal time: Sat 2025-10-11 20:06:35 UTC
                 RTC time: Sat 2025-10-11 20:06:35
                Time zone: America/New_York (EDT, -0400)
System clock synchronized: yes
              NTP service: active
          RTC in local TZ: no