Every country has a different time zone. But among all of them, New Zealand is especially famous for its two different time zones.
New Zealand is a country where there are two time zones depending on the climatic and geographical differences between the two islands of New Zealand.
What is New Zealand Time Zone and How It is Calculated?
New Zealand is a country that is made of several islands and depending on the geographical changes the time zone in New Zealand has been divided into two different categories.
One is considered New Zealand Standard Time and another is known as Chatham Standard Time. The reasons and the explanation to divide the time zone into two categories are mentioned below.
New Zealand Standard Time: The main islands of New Zealand fall under this particular time zone and it is six and half hours ahead of Indian Standard Time.
Chatham Standard Time: The Chatham Islands and the nearest areas fall under this time zone and this is seven hours ahead of Indian Standard Time.
There is another well-acclaimed method to calculate the timings in two different time zones of New Zealand.
New Zealand Standard Time: It is 12 hours ahead of the Coordinated Universal Time.
Chatham Standard Time: It is 12 hours and 45 minutes ahead of Coordinated Universal Time.
The Reasons Behind Two Different Time Zones in New Zealand:
There are various reasons behind dividing the time zones of New Zealand into two categories. They are mentioned below one by one.
- During the Second World War, the clocks were advanced and the timing of most European countries got half an hour ahead of the GMT or The Greenwich Mean Time. When World War ended, the timing did not get rectified by anyone. From that time, the New Zealand Standard Time is six hours ahead of GMT.
- Time at different places and countries vary because of the longitudinal differences of the places.
- It also depends on the rotation of the earth.
- The northern islands of New Zealand have a different climate than the South islands.
- In the northern areas, people can find subtropical climates and in the southern areas, the temperature can go down to minus 10-degree Celsius. Because of this drastic difference in the climates of the northern and southern areas of New Zealand, the time zone has been divided into two categories.
In this blog, I have mentioned all the possible factors that are responsible for the two different times zones in New Zealand.