Eastern Time cities
Live clocks and local time facts for every major city in the zone.
Live · ET · Miami, Florida
Current time in Miami
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Miami keeps Eastern Time: EST (UTC−5) in winter and EDT (UTC−4) from the second Sunday in March to the first Sunday in November – the same clock as New York.
- Now in effect
- EST or EDT
- Next clock change
- Second Sunday in March
- Countdown
- —
- Daylight through the year
- 10h 32m – 13h 45m
What time zone is Miami in?
Miami, the seat of Miami-Dade County, is on the Eastern Time Zone, and so is the rest of the Florida peninsula: Fort Lauderdale, the Palm Beaches, the Keys and Orlando all read the same clock. Phones and computers file the city under the IANA zone America/New_York, the same entry that drives the live Eastern Time clock on our homepage, so a Miami meeting at 10:00 AM is a 10:00 AM meeting in Manhattan or Atlanta too.
Florida as a whole is not one zone, though. Most of the Panhandle west of the Apalachicola River – Pensacola, Fort Walton Beach, Panama City – keeps Central Time, one hour behind Miami all year. Pensacola lies 860 km (536 mi) from Miami in a straight line – farther than Miami is from Havana – and reads an hour earlier. The county-by-county boundary and its history are on the Florida time zone page.
Two airports serve the area, and both print departures in Eastern Time: MIA, Miami International, in Miami-Dade County, and FLL, Fort Lauderdale–Hollywood International, in neighbouring Broward County.
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| County | Miami-Dade County, Florida |
| Time zone | Eastern (America/New_York) |
| Winter / summer | EST, UTC−5 / EDT, UTC−4 |
| Airports | MIA (Miami) · FLL (Fort Lauderdale) |
| Coordinates | 25.76°N, 80.19°W |
| Solar noon | 12:04–12:35 PM EST · 1:04–1:30 PM EDT |
Why do Miami's days barely change length?
At about 25.8°N, Miami is the southernmost major city on North American Eastern Time, and latitude decides how much daylight swings between seasons. On the winter solstice the sun is up for about 10 hours 32 minutes; on the summer solstice, 13 hours 45 minutes. The gap – 3 hours 13 minutes – is the smallest of any major city in the zone and less than half of Montreal's.
The cause is the 23.4° tilt of Earth's axis. Near the equator, the tilt barely changes how long a place spends on the sunlit side of the planet; toward the poles, it stretches summer days and squeezes winter ones. Miami is the large ET metro closest to the Tropic of Cancer (23.4°N), so its year is unusually even: the sun never sets before about 5:30 PM (late November) and never after about 8:16 PM (early July). In Toronto, by contrast, December sunsets come at 4:41 PM and June sunsets after 9:00 PM.
That evenness shapes the local daylight-saving debate: with winter sunrises no later than about 7:10 AM on standard time, Miami would pay a smaller price in dark mornings for permanent daylight time than northern cities would.
Sunrise and sunset in Miami today
- Sunrise
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- Sunset
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- Solar noon
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- Day length
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What daylight saving time does to Miami's sun
| Date | Clock | Sunrise | Sunset | Solar noon | Daylight |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dec 21, 2026 | EST | 7:03 AM | 5:35 PM | 12:19 PM | 10h 32m |
| Mar 20, 2027 | EDT | 7:25 AM | 7:32 PM | 1:28 PM | 12h 07m |
| Jun 21, 2027 | EDT | 6:30 AM | 8:15 PM | 1:23 PM | 13h 45m |
| Sep 23, 2027 | EDT | 7:10 AM | 7:16 PM | 1:13 PM | 12h 06m |
Miami's latest sunrises do not come in January. On standard time the sun is up by about 7:10 AM even in mid-January; the darkest mornings arrive instead right after clocks spring forward – about 7:37 AM on March 8, 2026 – and just before they fall back, when the sun rose around 7:29 AM on October 31, 2026. In June, DST turns what would be a 5:30 AM sunrise into a 6:30 AM one and pushes sunset past 8:15 PM.
Why does the sun peak after 1:00 PM in summer? EST was designed as mean solar time on the 75°W meridian, which passes just east of central Philadelphia. Miami lies at 80.19°W, 5.2° further west, so the sun crosses its sky about 21 minutes after it crosses that meridian. Add the DST hour and the "true noon" on June 21 falls at 1:23 PM. The equation of time – the wobble caused by Earth's elliptical orbit – then moves solar noon by up to a quarter of an hour either side over the year.
Will Florida stay on daylight saving time all year?
Not yet. In 2018 the Florida Legislature passed HB 1013, which includes the state's own "Sunshine Protection Act", by 33–2 in the Senate and 103–11 in the House, and Governor Rick Scott signed it in March 2018. It declares the Legislature's intent to make daylight time Florida's year-round standard – but only once Congress amends 15 U.S.C. § 260a. That federal law lets a state stay on standard time permanently, as Arizona and Hawaii do, but gives no option to stay on daylight time.
Florida's delegation has pushed the federal version ever since. It passed the US Senate by unanimous consent in March 2022 and died in the House. The 2025 bill, H.R. 139, sponsored by Rep. Vern Buchanan of Florida, passed the House 308–117 on July 14, 2026. It would make daylight time permanent nationwide, with an option for states to opt out; as of November 2026 it sits with the Senate Commerce Committee without a vote, so Miami still fell back on November 1, 2026 and, under current law, springs forward again on March 14, 2027. Our daylight saving time guide tracks the dates.
Permanent EDT in Miami (computed): latest sunrise about 8:09 AM in mid-January, roughly 55 mornings a year with sunrise after 8:00 AM, and an earliest sunset of 6:29 PM instead of 5:29 PM.
Permanent EST instead: June sunrises near 5:30 AM and summer sunsets capped at about 7:16 PM. Neither option changes the amount of daylight – only which end of the day gets it. See EST vs EDT for what each label means.
Which cities near Miami share its time?
- Fort Lauderdale – 40 km (25 mi) north in Broward County, home of FLL. Same clock, same sunrise to within a minute.
- West Palm Beach – 107 km (66 mi) north, seat of Palm Beach County. At 26.7°N its summer days run a few minutes longer than Miami's.
- Key West – 209 km (130 mi) southwest in Monroe County, at the end of the Overseas Highway. At 81.78°W it sits further west, so its sun rises and sets roughly 4–9 minutes after Miami's, depending on the season, on the same Eastern clock.
For other large cities on this clock, from New York to Montreal, browse all Eastern Time cities.
- Miami and nearby cities, all on Eastern Time
Frequently asked questions
Is Havana on the same time as Miami?
Not this winter. Cuba normally changes its clocks on the same Sundays as the United States, but at midnight. In October 2026 its government announced that it would not fall back on November 1, 2026 and would stay on UTC−4 until November 7, 2027. Until then Havana is one hour ahead of Miami in winter and on the same time as Miami in summer.
Would Pensacola still be an hour behind Miami under permanent daylight saving time?
Almost certainly. The federal Sunshine Protection Act, passed by the House in July 2026, would make daylight time permanent nationwide unless a state opts out. The Panhandle would stay on Central Time, just permanently on UTC−5, while Miami would be permanently on UTC−4. Unless Florida treated its two zones differently, the one-hour gap would remain.
What time is it in Miami when it is noon in Los Angeles?
3:00 PM. Miami is always three hours ahead of Pacific Time because both zones change their clocks on the same Sundays.
Are Orlando, Tampa and Jacksonville on Miami time?
Yes. All of peninsular Florida and the eastern Panhandle, including Tallahassee, use Eastern Time. Only the western Panhandle is on Central Time.
Why do Miami flight and cruise schedules say ET instead of EST?
ET means whichever Eastern offset is in force on that date: EST (UTC−5) in winter or EDT (UTC−4) in summer. Writing ET avoids the common mistake of labelling a July departure as EST.
Explore
Florida time zones
Which Panhandle counties run on Central Time, and why the line follows the Apalachicola.
Time in Atlanta
Another southern ET city – and one of the latest solar noons in the zone.
Daylight saving time
Every spring-forward and fall-back date, and the history of the rule.