timedatectl systemd Developer Lennart Poettering lennart@poettering.net timedatectl 1 timedatectl Control the system time and date timedatectl OPTIONS COMMAND Description timedatectl may be used to query and change the system clock and its settings. Use systemd-firstboot1 to initialize the system time zone for mounted (but not booted) system images. timedatectl may be used to show the current status of systemd-timesyncd.service8. Options The following options are understood: Do not query the user for authentication for privileged operations. If set-local-rtc is invoked and this option is passed, the system clock is synchronized from the RTC again, taking the new setting into account. Otherwise, the RTC is synchronized from the system clock. If timesync-status is invoked and this option is passed, then timedatectl monitors the status of systemd-timesyncd.service8 and updates the outputs. Use Ctrl-C to terminate the monitoring. When showing properties of systemd-timesyncd.service8, show all properties regardless of whether they are set or not. When showing properties of systemd-timesyncd.service8, limit display to certain properties as specified as argument. If not specified, all set properties are shown. The argument should be a property name, such as ServerName. If specified more than once, all properties with the specified names are shown. When printing properties with show-timesync, only print the value, and skip the property name and =. Commands The following commands are understood: status Show current settings of the system clock and RTC, including whether network time synchronization through systemd-timesyncd.service is active. Even if it is inactive, a different service might still synchronize the clock. If no command is specified, this is the implied default. set-time [TIME] Set the system clock to the specified time. This will also update the RTC time accordingly. The time may be specified in the format "2012-10-30 18:17:16". set-timezone [TIMEZONE] Set the system time zone to the specified value. Available timezones can be listed with list-timezones. If the RTC is configured to be in the local time, this will also update the RTC time. This call will alter the /etc/localtime symlink. See localtime5 for more information. list-timezones List available time zones, one per line. Entries from the list can be set as the system timezone with set-timezone. set-local-rtc [BOOL] Takes a boolean argument. If 0, the system is configured to maintain the RTC in universal time. If 1, it will maintain the RTC in local time instead. Note that maintaining the RTC in the local timezone is not fully supported and will create various problems with time zone changes and daylight saving adjustments. If at all possible, keep the RTC in UTC mode. Note that invoking this will also synchronize the RTC from the system clock, unless is passed (see above). This command will change the 3rd line of /etc/adjtime, as documented in hwclock8. set-ntp [BOOL] Takes a boolean argument. Controls whether network time synchronization is active and enabled (if available). If the argument is true, this enables and starts the first existed service listed in the environment variable $SYSTEMD_TIMEDATED_NTP_SERVICES of systemd-timedated.service. If the argument is false, then this disables and stops the all services listed in $SYSTEMD_TIMEDATED_NTP_SERVICES. systemd-timesyncd Commands The following commands are specific to systemd-timesyncd.service8. timesync-status Show current status of systemd-timesyncd.service8. If is specified, then this will monitor the status updates. show-timesync Show properties of the manager of systemd-timesyncd.service8. By default, empty properties are suppressed. Use to show those too. To select specific properties to show, use . This command is intended to be used whenever computer-parsable output is required. Use if you are looking for formatted human-readable output. Exit status On success, 0 is returned, a non-zero failure code otherwise. Examples Show current settings: $ timedatectl Local time: Thu 2017-09-21 16:08:56 CEST Universal time: Thu 2017-09-21 14:08:56 UTC RTC time: Thu 2017-09-21 14:08:56 Time zone: Europe/Warsaw (CEST, +0200) System clock synchronized: yes NTP service: active RTC in local TZ: no Enable network time synchronization: $ timedatectl set-ntp true ==== AUTHENTICATING FOR org.freedesktop.timedate1.set-ntp === Authentication is required to control whether network time synchronization shall be enabled. Authenticating as: user Password: ******** ==== AUTHENTICATION COMPLETE === $ systemctl status systemd-timesyncd.service ● systemd-timesyncd.service - Network Time Synchronization Loaded: loaded (/usr/lib/systemd/system/systemd-timesyncd.service; enabled) Active: active (running) since Mo 2015-03-30 14:20:38 CEST; 5s ago Docs: man:systemd-timesyncd.service(8) Main PID: 595 (systemd-timesyn) Status: "Using Time Server 216.239.38.15:123 (time4.google.com)." CGroup: /system.slice/systemd-timesyncd.service └─595 /usr/lib/systemd/systemd-timesyncd … Show current status of systemd-timesyncd.service8: $ timedatectl timesync-status Server: 216.239.38.15 (time4.google.com) Poll interval: 1min 4s (min: 32s; max 34min 8s) Leap: normal Version: 4 Stratum: 1 Reference: GPS Precision: 1us (-20) Root distance: 335us (max: 5s) Offset: +316us Delay: 349us Jitter: 0 Packet count: 1 Frequency: -8.802ppm See Also systemd1, hwclock8, date1, localtime5, systemctl1, systemd-timedated.service8, systemd-timesyncd.service8, systemd-firstboot1