Convert CEST to WAT

WAT is 1 hour behind CEST. CEST is UTC+2 and WAT is UTC+1.

Best time to schedule a meeting

Standard 9–5 working hours overlap for 7 hours: 10:00 AM–5:00 PM CEST (9:00 AM–4:00 PM WAT). Schedule meetings inside that window.

CEST to WAT conversion table

About CEST

Central European Summer Time (CEST) is UTC+2. It is used in Paris, Berlin, Madrid and Rome from late March to late October.

Central European Summer Time is UTC+2, in force from the last Sunday in March to the last Sunday in October. The European changeover happens at 01:00 UTC everywhere simultaneously, unlike the US which changes at 2am local time in each zone — so Europe's internal offsets never break during the transition, while North America's briefly do.

About WAT

West Africa Time (WAT) is UTC+1. It is used in Nigeria, Cameroon, Angola and much of central and western Africa.

West Africa Time is UTC+1 all year, with no daylight saving anywhere that uses it. It covers Lagos, Kinshasa and Luanda — a very large population on a single fixed offset. It matches Central European Time in winter and falls an hour behind it in summer, which means a standing Europe–Nigeria meeting moves twice a year at the European end and never at the African one.

Does this gap change with the seasons?

This gap is seasonal. The abbreviations themselves are fixed offsets, but the region on CEST switches to CET (UTC+1) from late October to late March. So the 1-hour figure on this page is correct for the part of the year when both places are actually on these abbreviations, and changes by an hour outside it.

WAT does not shift, so the whole change comes from one side. A recurring meeting fixed in WAT will appear to move by an hour for everyone on the other side, twice a year, without anyone changing anything.

This is the reason scheduling systems store an IANA zone such as Region/City rather than an offset or an abbreviation: the zone knows its own rules and the offset does not.

Frequently asked questions

Other CEST conversions

• CEST to UTC
• CEST to GMT
• CEST to EST
• CEST to EDT
• CEST to CST
• CEST to CDT
• CEST to MST
• CEST to MDT
• CEST to PST
• CEST to PDT
• CEST to AKST
• CEST to HST
• CEST to BRT
• CEST to BST
• CEST to CET
• CEST to EEST

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