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I'm running Windows 10 Pro. My time zone is Jerusalem, but I need to change it to Eastern to test a program I'm working on.

The time zone won't change. I have tried:

  • From the clock/calendar, when I change it - it changes back.
  • From Control Panel - Date and Time, "Change time zone..." - when I click save I get the message "Error occurred - your changes could not be saved."
  • As the Built-in Administrator from the command line using tzutil - I get the message "Insufficient privileges to set the current time zone."

The registry key TimeZoneInformation has Full Control for Administrators

Administrators are listed in the Local Security Setting "Change the Time Zone"

Any suggestions?

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  • You can also right-click the icon in the tray area and "Disable Qustodio temporarily". This allows you to change the time. Since Qustodio has time-based rules, if it allowed you to change the time zone, it would be a pretty easy way for kids to bypass restrictions which would make that feature pointless.
    – tony722
    Oct 6, 2022 at 4:09

4 Answers 4

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Windows 10 Home can get in a state where it requires admin to change the time zone, even though there's no group policy. It worked for me to run tzutil as a standard user with privilege elevated via UAC (as opposed to using the admin account, which the OP tried).

  1. Open an admin console (Windows+X,A).

  2. Enter tzutil /l to list time zone choices.

  3. Copy the the one you want to the clipboard and paste it in quotes after tzutil /s, e.g.:

     tzutil /s "Pacific Standard Time"
    
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  • 2
    I couldn't find anything in my group policy editor related to time zones, but this worked great!
    – caps
    Jun 21, 2019 at 5:11
  • Same here. Nothing in GPO was setting timezone, and changing the not greyed out Timezone dropdown in Windows time/date settings didn't stick when coming back into it after a change. Using tzutil as described above fixed the issue (On Windows Server 2019 Datacenter, to boot).
    – user66001
    Mar 27, 2020 at 14:30
  • This worked for me, mi windows 2019 server does not save changes (for some reason) I change the time zone then open again and was changed back. This command did the change permanent
    – DefToneR
    Sep 3, 2021 at 17:23
  • 1
    Just had the same problem on Windows 11, and this worked great. Thank you.
    – Marco
    Mar 27, 2022 at 23:56
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The problem we had, was due to the internet monitoring/filtering software Qustodio which was installed on the machine. We removed it.

If Qustodio ever resolves this problem - that the software denies the Administrator the ability to change the time zone - we would love to install it again.

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  • I also have Qustodio installed. I will try to uninstall and see if that fixes my problem
    – Big Al
    Feb 21, 2021 at 23:42
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    This turned out to be my problem. Time zone wouldn't update automatically and I couldn't change it manually even after using "Local Security Policy" to explicitly give both the "Users" group and my administrator account explicit permission to change time and zone. Disabling Qustodio temporarily did not allow me to set the time zone. I had to uninstall completely, then it updated automatically. Re-installing Qustodio kept the time zone set properly.
    – benrifkah
    Aug 15, 2021 at 22:44
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You probably have the fall update installed, which adds the "set time zone automatically feature". Simply turn off that feature from the Date and time settings page (not the classic control panel) and you can set the time zone manually.

screenshot

If you're still having problems, or the manual time zone selection is disabled even when you've turned off the automatic feature, then you probably have the "Change the time zone" policy configured. Check your local and/or domain group policies in effect.

screenshot

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  • 4
    The important information omitted from this answer is how to edit the "change time zone" policy. Type WIndows key, then gpedit; select 'Edit group policy'; navigate to Computer Configuration\Windows Settings\Security Settings\Local Policies\User Rights Assignment (not an obvious path!). More info here: superuser.com/a/1532684/1242694
    – shmim
    Dec 1, 2020 at 5:42
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If Qustodio is causing the problem, here's what worked on my PC: (Assuming you have admin control over the application) - Right click the Qustodio icon - Select Disable Temporarily (give it 15 mins or whatever) - Change your timezone in Windows normally - Reboot just to verify that it stuck

The best way to avoid the issue, though, is to make sure you have the timezone set properly before installing Qustodio. Which I forgot to do this time. The reason Qustodio does this is that it has parental controls that govern access time windows for user accounts on the PC. (So if the user could change the timezone, they could circumvent this control.)

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