Time zones cause booking confusion when handled poorly.
The Problem
- Business in New York
- Customer in Los Angeles
- Calendar shows 2 PM
- Whose 2 PM?
Best Practices
Store in UTC: All times stored as UTC internally.
Display locally: Convert to user's timezone for display.
Be explicit: Always show timezone with times.
Detecting User Timezone
JavaScript can detect browser timezone: Intl.DateTimeFormat().resolvedOptions().timeZone
Displaying Times
Show times in user's timezone with clear label: "2:00 PM Pacific Time"
Conversion
When booking:
- User selects time in their timezone
- Convert to UTC for storage
- Convert to business timezone for calendar
Edge Cases
- Daylight saving transitions
- Ambiguous times
- Invalid times
Bookux
Bookux builds booking systems with proper timezone handling.
Related: Real-Time Availability · Clickable Time Slots