Argentina
Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...
is located at a longitude that would naturally put it in the
UTC−04:00 or
UTC−05:00 time zone
A time zone is an area which observes a uniform standard time for legal, Commerce, commercial and social purposes. Time zones tend to follow the boundaries between Country, countries and their Administrative division, subdivisions instead of ...
; however, it actually uses the
UTC−03:00 time zone. Argentina determines whether to change clocks in observation of
daylight saving time
Daylight saving time (DST), also referred to as daylight savings time, daylight time (Daylight saving time in the United States, United States and Daylight saving time in Canada, Canada), or summer time (British Summer Time, United Kingdom, ...
on a year-by-year basis, and individual
provinces
A province is an administrative division within a country or state. The term derives from the ancient Roman , which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire's territorial possessions outside Italy. The term ''provi ...
may opt out of the
federal decision. At present, Argentina does not change clocks.
The
Argentine Hydrographic Service maintains the official national time.
History
The first official standardization of time in Argentina took place on 31 October 1894, with establishment of
UTC−04:00 as the nation's
standard time
Standard time is the synchronization of clocks within a geographical region to a single time standard, rather than a local mean time standard. Generally, standard time agrees with the local mean time at some meridian that passes through the r ...
.
From 1920 to 1969, the official time switched biannually between UTC−04:00 as standard time in winter and
UTC−03:00 as daylight saving time in summer.
From 1974 to 1993, clocks advanced again, such that the official time switched biannually between UTC−03:00 as winter DST and
UTC−02:00 as summer double DST.
In 1993, the national time was fixed at
UTC−03:00, called Argentina Time (ART; ).
In 2007 and 2008, biannual switching between UTC–3:00 (winter DST) and UTC–2:00 (summer DST) resumed; in 2009, this was replaced again with year-round UTC–3:00 (permanent DST).
IANA time zone database
In the file
zone.tab of the
IANA time zone database
The tz database is a collaborative compilation of information about the world's time zones and rules for observing daylight saving time, primarily intended for use with computer programs and operating systems. Paul Eggert has been its editor an ...
Argentina has the following zones:
# America/Argentina/Buenos_Aires – Buenos Aires (BA, CF)
# America/Argentina/Cordoba – most locations (CD, CC, CR, ER, FO, MN, SF)
# America/Argentina/Salta (SA, LP, NQ, RN)
# America/Argentina/Jujuy – Jujuy (JY)
# America/Argentina/Tucuman – Tucuman (TM)
# America/Argentina/Catamarca – Catamarca (CT), Chubut (CH)
# America/Argentina/La Rioja – La Rioja (LR)
# America/Argentina/San Juan – San Juan (SJ)
# America/Argentina/Mendoza – Mendoza (MZ)
# America/Argentina/San Luis – San Luis (SL)
# America/Argentina/Rio Gallegos – Santa Cruz (SC)
# America/Argentina/Ushuaia – Tierra del Fuego (TF)
# America/Argentina/Santiago_del_Estero (SE)
Full History
Notes
:1.Date format: DD-MM-YYYY
:2.
Catamarca,
Chubut,
Jujuy,
La Pampa,
La Rioja
La Rioja () is an autonomous communities in Spain, autonomous community and provinces of Spain, province in Spain, in the north of the Iberian Peninsula. Its capital is Logroño. Other List of municipalities in La Rioja, cities and towns in the ...
,
Mendoza,
Neuquén
Neuquén (; ) is the capital city of the Argentine province of Neuquén and of the Confluencia Department, located in the east of the province. It occupies a strip of land west of the confluence of the Limay and Neuquén rivers which form t ...
,
Río Negro,
Salta
Salta () is the capital and largest city in the Provinces of Argentina, Argentine province of Salta Province, the same name. With a population of 618,375 according to the 2010 census, it is also the List of cities in Argentina, 7th most-populous ...
,
San Juan San Juan, Spanish for Saint John (disambiguation), Saint John, most commonly refers to:
* San Juan, Puerto Rico
* San Juan, Argentina
* San Juan, Metro Manila, a highly urbanized city in the Philippines
San Juan may also refer to:
Places Arge ...
,
San Luis,
Santa Cruz and
Tierra del Fuego, Antártida e Islas del Atlántico Sur, continued using -3 Timezone.
References
tz database– The tz database contains an extensive history of time zone and daylight saving time changes, with references to official sources for changes to time zones, for Argentina and the rest of the world.
External links
Husos Horarios Adoptados en la República Argentina- Servicio de Hidrografía Naval, Ministerio de Defensa
Geography of Argentina
Time in South America
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