How to Set Linux Timezone to CST (Asia/Shanghai) in Minutes

In Linux you can change the system timezone to CST (China Standard Time, GMT+8, also known as Asia/Shanghai) by following these steps.

Method 1: Using timedatectl (recommended for most modern distributions)

Check current timezone: timedatectl Output shows something like:

Local time: Fri 2024-11-29 10:00:00 CST
Universal time: Fri 2024-11-29 02:00:00 UTC
RTC time: Fri 2024-11-29 02:00:00
Time zone: Asia/Shanghai (CST, +0800)

List available timezones: timedatectl list-timezones | grep Shanghai The result should contain Asia/Shanghai .

Set timezone to CST (Asia/Shanghai): sudo timedatectl set-timezone Asia/Shanghai Verify the change: timedatectl The output should display Time zone: Asia/Shanghai (CST, +0800) .

Method 2: Manually linking /etc/localtime

Backup the existing configuration: sudo mv /etc/localtime /etc/localtime.bak Link to the CST zone file:

sudo ln -sf /usr/share/zoneinfo/Asia/Shanghai /etc/localtime

Verify: date The output should show the current time in CST (GMT+8).

Method 3: Temporary change via environment variable

If you only need a temporary adjustment, set the TZ variable in the current session: export TZ="Asia/Shanghai" Check with: date Note: This change lasts only for the current session and is lost after a reboot or opening a new terminal.

Important notes

Using timedatectl is the recommended approach for modern Linux distributions.

Make sure the system clock (UTC) is correct; the timezone only affects how the time is displayed.

Manually linking /etc/localtime is useful for older systems that do not support timedatectl.