Americas · Central America · Sovereign state
Current time in Costa Rica
A single time zone at UTC-06:00.
Wednesday, October 14, 2026
About Costa Rica's time
A single time zone.
Costa Rica uses a single time zone—Central Standard Time (UTC-06:00)—all year round, with no daylight saving time adjustments.
Major cities
Cities of Costa Rica.
History
How Costa Rica keeps time.
Costa Rica has used UTC-06:00 as its standard time since 1921, when it replaced San José Mean Time (about UTC-05:36). The country briefly observed daylight saving time (UTC-05:00) in 1979-1980 and again in 1991-1992; the last period ended on March 15, 1992, and clocks have stayed on UTC-06:00 year-round since.
Convert
Costa Rica to the world's clocks.
Frequently asked questions
Common questions about Costa Rica's time zone, daylight saving rules, and how to handle it in software. Can't find what you need? Email [email protected].
- What is the time zone in Costa Rica?
- Costa Rica uses Central Standard Time (UTC-06:00) year-round.
- Does Costa Rica observe daylight saving time?
- No, Costa Rica does not observe daylight saving time and remains on Central Standard Time (UTC-06:00) throughout the year.
- Has Costa Rica ever used daylight saving time?
- Briefly. Costa Rica moved clocks to UTC-05:00 in 1979-1980 and 1991-1992; since March 15, 1992 it has stayed on UTC-06:00 all year.
Source: IANA tzdb2026d · Reviewed
Free · Developer API
This country, as JSON.
Its default time zone, zone and city counts and DST summary, from one endpoint.
Also in the API: time zones by coordinates, conversions that flag daylight saving gaps, and abbreviations decoded.
Moving off WorldTimeAPI? Our drop-in replacement needs no key.