How to set timezone in Intellij IDEA

2021-05-28 | 1 min read

Quick note on how to set timezone in Intellij IDEA.

Steps

Step 1: Create a simple java project (main() method to just print the current date-time for testing)
Step 2: Set timezone in Intellij (will set timezone via JVM options)

Step 1: Create a simple java project

Create a Java project with only one single java class called App.java.
Create its method main to be executable
Print the current date and time in console

import java.util.Date;

public class App {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        System.out.println(new Date());
    }

}

Run the app (right click on the class > Run App.main), current date and time reflects my timezone in the console (Peru in my case):

Fri May 28 16:38:08 PET 2021

Step 2: Set timezone in Intellij

Open Run/Debug Configurations and click on Add VM options

Under VM options, type the timezone you want. Example: -Duser.timezone="UTC" if you want UTC.

Run the application again, current date and time should now reflect UTC in the console:

Fri May 28 21:43:39 UTC 2021

Notes

Tested with:

Intellij IDEA v2021.1.1
Java 8