The United States and South Africa: how many working hours a remote team actually shares
Between the United States and South Africa the working days overlap by 3 hours at best — and in the worst pairing they do not overlap at all.
City by city
Shared hours of a 09:00–18:00 working day, computed for September 10, 2026.
Is that enough?
The staffing rule of thumb is 2–3 shared hours for engineering, 4–6 for sales and support. Against the best city pairing in this corridor:
| Engineering, async-friendly (2–3 h) | 3 h | works |
|---|---|---|
| Sales and support (4–6 h) | 3 h | does not work without someone shifting hours |
Working out what those hours cost? The meeting-cost calculator prices a recurring call in the United States and in South Africa. costof.autofract.com
What daylight saving does to it
The gap between these two countries is not constant. Over the next twelve months it takes these values:
| From | to | Difference | Shared working hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| September 10, 2026 | October 31, 2026 | +6 h | 3 h |
| November 1, 2026 | March 13, 2027 | +7 h | 2 h |
| March 14, 2027 | October 14, 2027 | +6 h | 3 h |
The city pairs behind these numbers
Offsets and daylight-saving rules come from the IANA time zone database through the standard Intl API — the same source the board uses, so nothing here is a hand-written offset table. Working hours are 09:00–18:00 local on both sides unless you change them on the board. City names and coordinates: GeoNames (CC BY 4.0).
Computed on September 10, 2026 · About