VSTS Time Zone Settings

There seems to be a bit of confusion about time zone settings in VSTS. The confusion comes from the fact that there are two places where time zone settings can be configured for VSTS users: VSTS account time zone setting and VSTS user profile time zone setting.

VSTS account time zone setting is the MAIN time zone setting. This time zone setting is used by VSTS account for storing all date/time data. In other words, when you set your VSTS account time zone to EST, all timestamps in VSTS will be stored in EST time zone. Another good example of when VSTS account time zone setting is used is when you configure iteration dates, build/release schedules, etc. Account time zone setting is configured on the Account Settings page: https://*.visualstudio.com/_admin/_home/settings.

VSTS user profile time zone setting is used to make user experience more personal to the user and display the VSTS time stamps for when a user browsing VSTS using time zone configured for that specific user. So, if my VSTS account time zone is set to EST, but my user profile time zone setting is set to PST, then when I'm browsing the VSTS all date/time fields will be displayed in PST time zone. VSTS user profile time zone setting can be configured on user profile page (https://app.vsaex.visualstudio.com/me?mkt=en-US&campaign=o~msft~vsts~usercard), by clicking your name on the top-right corner of your VSTS page, then clicking on My Profile | Edit profile | Preferences option. Set your user time zone setting and click Save.