Cape Town in numbers
- Coordinates
- -33.8927, 18.5942
- Population
- 4 772 846
- Region
- Western Cape
- Country
- South Africa, Africa
- Capital
- Cape Town — 0 km away
What time is it in Cape Town, Western Cape, South Africa
Cape Town in South Africa’s Western Cape keeps South Africa Standard Time, UTC+2, all year. There is no daylight-saving change, so sunrise, sunset, and weather attach to that fixed offset.
Cape Town, South Africa
Friday, 4 September 2026
UTC+2 · Africa/Johannesburg
Local time in Cape Town
UTC+2 · no daylight saving time
The sun today
Sunrise 07:02 Solar noon 12:46 Sunset 18:31 Daylight 11 h 29 min Night 12 h 31 min Civil twilight 06:37 – 18:56
Weather in Cape Town right now
Loading the current weather…
Weather data by Open-Meteo, updated every 30 minutes.
Cape Town and its neighbours
Postal codes
- 7100
- 7103
- 7400
- 7404
- 7405
- 7406
- 7407
- 7420
- 7425
- 7430
- 7435
- 7437
Postal codes come from the free GeoNames dataset. Where a code is listed with a distance, it belongs to a nearby settlement — GeoNames spells that name differently from ours.
Largest cities in Western Cape
- Athlone 237 414
- Paarl 236 910
- Somerset West 225 289
- George 188 580
- Worcester 127 597
- Stellenbosch 96 228
Same time zone — Africa/Johannesburg
- Johannesburg South Africa
- Durban South Africa
- Pretoria South Africa
- Soweto South Africa
- Gqeberha South Africa
- Soshanguve South Africa
Nearby places
- Guguletu — 10.3 km
- Nyanga — 10.6 km
- Endhoven — 10.9 km
- Eindhoven — 10.9 km
- Delft South — 11.2 km
- Crossroads — 11.3 km
What time is it in Cape Town
The city uses the national civil offset, two hours ahead of UTC, shared with Johannesburg, Durban, and Pretoria. Africa/Johannesburg is the usual IANA name. Cape Town is the legislative capital, but it does not keep a parliamentary clock of its own. If your device is set to South Africa, the hour in the City Bowl is the hour on the Highveld.
The light is not shared. Cape Town sits near 34° south, on a peninsula between the Atlantic and False Bay. Johannesburg sits on the interior plateau. The clocks match; the sun tables do not. A winter morning that is already bright inland can still be a late, grey start against Table Mountain. Quote UTC+2 for the meeting. Quote a Cape Town sunrise if the meeting is a beach walk.
Because the offset is fixed, conversion does not depend on the month. Add two hours to UTC. Subtract two hours from Cape Town to reach UTC. The usual error is to import a daylight-saving rule from Europe, Namibia’s past practice, or a Chilean counterpart at a similar latitude. South Africa’s present civil rule is a steady UTC+2. Table Mountain does not observe daylight saving, and neither does the city under it.
One South African hour
South Africa Standard Time is national. You will not gain an hour by driving from the Waterfront to Stellenbosch, or lose one on the way to the airport. What you will change is wind, cloud, and the moment the sun clears a slope. For civil purposes the Western Cape is not a separate zone from Gauteng.
Set calendars to Africa/Johannesburg for a Cape Town event. Ignore European summer time when converting into this city. If the other party is in Santiago, remember that city does change clocks, and on a southern schedule.
Keep timestamps in UTC when a later reader might not know which country “Cape” meant. There are other Capes. Cape Town is the South African one. If a shipping form only says “Cape,” confirm the country before you trust the offset. UTC+2 is correct here; it is not a magic label for every cape on a map.
Peninsula light and winter rain
Day length at this latitude changes strongly through the year. December days are long; June days are short. With no daylight-saving patch, the whole swing shows up in sunrise and sunset times. Midsummer evenings stay usable late. Midwinter afternoons fail early. That is the sun, not a statute.
The peninsula also blocks and bends light. Table Mountain, Devil’s Peak, and the Twelve Apostles can delay a visible sunrise or cut an evening short depending on which side of the mountain you stand. Calculated times assume a clear horizon. A beach in Camps Bay and a street in the southern suburbs will not see the disk at the same civil minute even though both use UTC+2.
The climate is Mediterranean: dry summers, wetter winters, and a strong southeasterly in the warm months. Winter rain and cloud can erase a sunrise that still exists on the sun table. Summer wind can clear the sky and make late light look longer than the clock. Pair the forecast with the zone. The offset will not surprise you. The mountain and the front might.
Questions and answers
- Does Cape Town change clocks for summer?
- No. South Africa Standard Time stays on UTC+2 all year.
- Is Cape Town on the same time as Johannesburg?
- Yes, civilly. Sunrise, wind, and rain still follow the peninsula, not the Highveld.
- What zone name should I use?
- Africa/Johannesburg, which is the standard identifier for South African civil time.