Pacific time for a Central audience
Central is two hours ahead of Pacific. An 8:00 AM Pacific start is 10:00 AM in Chicago, and a 2:30 PM Pacific call lands at 4:30 PM in Dallas. Type your Pacific time, or press Use now, and the Central time appears.
The abbreviations here are often mixed up in conversation. PST and CST are winter names; during daylight saving the zones are PDT and CDT. The two-hour gap is unchanged because both zones shift together, so a wrong abbreviation rarely means a wrong time. The page shows the correct abbreviation for the date you choose.
Teams in California or Washington that support customers in Texas or the Midwest find the early Pacific hours the most useful. A 9:00 AM Pacific start is 11:00 AM Central, and the Central workday has two hours behind it already. A 9:00 to 17:00 Pacific day runs 11:00 AM to 7:00 PM Central, which the hour-by-hour table shows hour by hour. The Central late afternoon is covered, and the Central morning is not.
Late Pacific evenings spill over midnight: 11:00 PM Pacific is 1:00 AM the following day in Central. The result flags the new date. The swap button reverses the direction.
Worked examples
Questions about this tool
Is Central two hours ahead of Pacific?
Yes. Add two hours to a Pacific time to get the Central time.
Which Pacific hours fit a Central workday?
Pacific 7:00 AM to 3:00 PM matches Central 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM, so a Pacific team starting at 7:00 AM covers the full Central day.
Does the gap change when clocks change?
No. Both zones change on the same weekends, so the gap stays at two hours.
Related tools
Where this comes from: IANA time zone database and the rules behind it ยท US Department of Transportation, uniform time and daylight saving time