how wide are time zones
Earth is divided into twenty-four time zones of approximately equal width. The time in each successive time zone is one hour different from the times in neighboring time zones. To establish time zones, Earth's rotation rate of 360 degrees of longitude per day was divided by 24 hours. The result shows that Earth turns 15 degrees of longitude per hour. Adopting time zones that are exactly 15 degrees wide would result in 24 equally spaced time zones around the world. For convenience, however, time zone boundaries often follow political boundaries instead of longitude lines, resulting in the irregularly shaped time zones shown below.