How the time zone overlap calculator works
Remote jobs often say things like "must overlap 4 hours with US Eastern time". The calculator shows what that means for your day.
- Your time zone is filled in from your browser. Change it if you plan to work from somewhere else.
- Pick the company's time zone, usually where the team is.
- Set the working hours for each side in their own local time.
- Read the shared hours in both time zones, and see both days side by side on the timeline.
The calculator uses today's offsets, so daylight saving time is included. Not every country changes its clocks, and the ones that do change on different dates, so check again in March, April, October and November.
How much overlap is enough?
It depends on how the team works. A rough guide:
- 4 hours or more: room for meetings, pairing and quick back-and-forth every day.
- 2 to 4 hours: enough for a daily stand-up and a few calls, with the rest done in writing.
- Under 2 hours: workable on async-first teams that write things down and rarely need live answers.
Making a small overlap work
- Shift your day by an hour or two instead of working late every night.
- Save shared hours for conversations, and do focused work outside them.
- Write updates that someone can act on without waiting for you to wake up.
- Ask in the interview how many hours of overlap the team really expects.
Find a remote job that fits your hours
Every listing on the remote jobs board shows whether it's open worldwide or only in certain countries or regions, so you can skip the ones that don't fit. You can also see which remote companies are hiring right now.
