Convert PKT to AST

AST is 9 hours behind PKT. PKT is UTC+5 and AST is UTC−4.

Which AST is this?

AST names more than one zone. This page reads it as Atlantic Standard Time at UTC−4, which is the reading most converters take. There is one other: Arabia Standard Time at UTC+3, used in Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, Bahrain, Qatar and Yemen.

The letters on a meeting invitation do not say which one is meant. If yours is not Atlantic Standard Time, the answer above is wrong, and not by a little:

The large converter sites disagree about this as well: search for a AST conversion and some of the results answer for one reading and some for another, none of them saying which they chose. Where it matters, ask which country the sender is in rather than which letters they typed.

Best time to schedule a meeting

Standard 9–5 working hours do not overlap at all between PKT and AST. Someone has to take an early or late call — or use asynchronous communication instead.

PKT to AST conversion table

About PKT

Pakistan Standard Time (PKT) is UTC+5. It is used in Pakistan, all year.

Pakistan Standard Time is UTC+5 and does not change through the year — daylight saving has been tried twice and abandoned twice. It sits half an hour behind India, which is the only pair of neighbouring countries in the region separated by a half-hour step rather than a whole one, and a common source of missed calls across that border.

About AST

Atlantic Standard Time (AST) is UTC−4. It is used in Halifax, Puerto Rico and the eastern Caribbean in winter.

Atlantic Standard Time is UTC−4, one hour ahead of Eastern. It covers Canada's Atlantic provinces, Puerto Rico and much of the eastern Caribbean, and it is the reason a call from Halifax to Toronto is an hour out from what either party expects. The abbreviation is also used for Arabia Standard Time at UTC+3, seven hours away in the other direction, which is a genuinely dangerous collision in scheduling.

Does this gap change with the seasons?

Neither PKT nor AST shifts with the seasons, so this 9-hour difference holds all year. That is unusual enough to be worth relying on: most cross-continental gaps move twice a year.

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 PKT conversions

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

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