The Best Meeting Times for US and Europe Remote Teams
The US–Europe corridor is one of the most well-trodden in remote work. Thousands of teams operate across this time zone gap every day, and the good news is that the overlap is genuinely workable — at least for teams on the East Coast. The West Coast is a different story.
Here's a practical breakdown of what actually works, what to avoid, and why the math is slightly different depending on which US city and which European city you're dealing with.
The US–Europe time zone landscape
The main European business centres sit between UTC+0 (UK in winter, Ireland) and UTC+2 (Central Europe in summer). The US East Coast is UTC−5 in winter and UTC−4 in summer. The West Coast is UTC−8 in winter and UTC−7 in summer.
That gives you these approximate gaps in winter (when both sides are off DST, or on it simultaneously):
| City pair | Typical gap |
|---|---|
| New York — London | 5 hours (4 during summer) |
| New York — Paris / Berlin / Amsterdam | 6 hours (5 during summer) |
| Chicago — London | 6 hours (5 during summer) |
| Los Angeles — London | 8 hours (7 during summer) |
| Los Angeles — Paris / Berlin | 9 hours (8 during summer) |
Note that "summer" here is complicated by the fact that the US and Europe transition to DST on slightly different dates in spring, creating a two-week window each year where the gap is temporarily one hour different from what you'd expect.
The golden window: New York and London
The New York–London pairing is one of the easier US–Europe combinations. With a 5-hour gap in winter and 4 hours in summer, there's a meaningful overlap window roughly between 9am–1pm Eastern / 2pm–6pm London time. The first half of the US workday coincides with the second half of the London workday.
In practice, the 9am–11am Eastern slot (2pm–4pm London) is the sweet spot most teams settle on. It's mid-afternoon for London, which means European colleagues are past the post-lunch dip but not yet thinking about logging off. And it gives New York enough morning to clear emails and urgent tasks before the call.
Avoid pushing too late into the New York morning — a 1pm Eastern call is 6pm London, which technically falls within business hours but feels like an end-of-day obligation for the UK side and often runs into after-work commitments.
Central Europe adds an hour
If your European colleagues are in Paris, Amsterdam, Berlin, Stockholm, Warsaw or anywhere else in the Central European time zone, add an hour to the London figures. A 9am New York call is already 3pm in Central Europe rather than 2pm. That's still workable, but it gives you less margin — a 12pm New York call would be 6pm in Berlin, which most people reasonably treat as outside normal hours.
For New York–Central Europe teams, the effective window is narrower: roughly 9am–11am Eastern / 3pm–5pm Central European. Two hours of comfortable overlap rather than four. Set your standing meeting in that window and protect it.
The West Coast problem
US West Coast teams have a genuinely difficult situation with European counterparts. With 8–9 hours separating Los Angeles from London or Amsterdam in winter, the working hour overlap is effectively zero based on standard 9–6 business hours.
A London workday runs 9am–6pm GMT. That's 1am–10am Los Angeles time in winter. The only window where both are in business hours simultaneously doesn't exist in any practical sense — London's end of day (5–6pm) is 9–10am Los Angeles, which gives you at best an hour of technical overlap, and only if the LA team is willing to start their day at 9am sharp and the London team is willing to hold the call in the last hour before logging off.
There is no perfect solution here. Options teams use in practice:
- Flex the London side early. A standing 8am London / 12am LA call — the London team starts an hour early, the LA team has an evening call. Doable occasionally but unsustainable as a permanent arrangement.
- Rotate the sacrifice. Alternate who takes the inconvenient slot. One week is 8am London, the next is 6pm London. Document the rotation so it's transparent.
- Go async-first. For teams with this much geographic separation, reducing synchronous meetings and relying on written updates, recorded walkthroughs and async video tools is often the more sustainable approach.
When DST transitions temporarily shift the math
The tricky period is the two-to-three weeks each spring when the US has already moved its clocks forward but most of Europe hasn't yet (or vice versa). During this window, New York–London might be only 4 hours apart rather than 5, which can actually expand your overlap window. But it also catches people out — a standing 9am Eastern meeting that was 2pm London is suddenly 1pm London, and European colleagues who didn't notice the transition might miss it.
The safe approach: whenever you're near a major DST transition date, verify the gap using a tool that checks the actual date, not a fixed offset assumption.
Setting a sustainable recurring meeting
For New York–London or New York–Europe teams, the practical recommendation is a Tuesday or Wednesday morning slot between 9am and 11am Eastern. Avoid Mondays (often used for internal catch-ups) and Fridays (European teams frequently finish earlier on Fridays). Midweek gives everyone enough runway to act on anything raised in the call before the week ends.
Book it for 45 minutes rather than an hour by default. Meetings tend to fill their allotted time, and a 45-minute slot at 9am Eastern keeps the London side free by 3pm without the call dragging to their end of day.
🕐 Verify your window: Add your US and European cities to the MyTimezonePlanner meeting planner and set the specific date of your next call. The overlap bar shows exactly when all locations are within business hours, adjusted for any DST differences on that date.
Time zone offsets and DST transition dates are subject to change by government decree. The times given here are approximations based on standard offsets. Always verify for specific dates using a tool that applies current DST rules.