/etc/localtime
lastmod 2026-11-10created 2021-10-062 edits
/etc/localtime is the file that determines the local time zone on a Linux system, usually a symbolic link pointing to the tzdata file for that time zone under /usr/share/zoneinfo. The C library reads this file when converting times to local time, and the time zone is set with timedatectl set-timezone or by changing the link directly. In containers, the host's copy of this file is often mounted to match the time zone.