We're Inside the DST Gap Right Now — Your Code Might Not Be

A field guide for developers building apps that dare to cross meridians You decided to build an app that tracks events worldwide. Bold move. Now let's talk about the moment you realize that time is not a simple integer and your clever Date.now() will absolutely betray you at the worst possible moment. Welcome to timezone hell. Population: every developer who ever shipped a scheduling feature. ⚠️ Real-time relevance: I'm writing this on March 24, 2026 — and we're currently living inside the US–Europe DST gap window. The US switched to EDT on March 8, but Europe doesn't switch to CEST until March 29. If your app hardcodes timezone offsets between New York and London (or Prague, or Paris), it's wrong right now . Step 1 — Know Where You Are (Spoiler: It Doesn't Matter) You live somewhere. You know your timezone. Congratulations, that's completely irrelevant to your backend. Your server doesn't care about Prague. Your server speaks UTC. GMT vs UTC: GMT is a timezone. UTC is a time standard.