Overview

Time zone settings define the date boundaries for your data reports, ensuring accurate statistics. The configured time zones determine when each day begins and ends for your analytics, so metrics like daily user visits or new merchant onboarding are calculated for the correct calendar days.

This topic explains how time zones are structured and applied across tenant and merchant workspaces, and how to check your current settings.

Time zone levels

Time zones are configured at the following levels to ensure accurate reporting for different data scopes:

• Workspace time zone: Sets the date boundaries for workspace-level statistics, such as the total number of merchants onboarded to your workspace. Defaults to UTC+08:00 if not set.
• App time zone: Sets the date boundaries for app-level statistics, such as page visits for a mini program that runs in a specific target app. If you have multiple target apps, time zones are set individually for each app. Defaults to UTC+08:00 if not set.

How time zone settings work

Setting up time zones is a combined offline and online process, involving the following steps:

1. Collection: Mini Program Platform collects the relevant time zone and region information for your workspace and apps, respectively. This process occurs offline, handled by the platform team.
2. Storage: Mini Program Platform stores the collected information.
3. Display and application: The configured time zones display in your workspace as a reference, and relevant data reports use the matching setting to group and present data. Note that mini program analytics are app-level statistics and the app time zone is applied as follows:

• If a mini program runs in a single app, all analytics use that app's time zone.
• If a mini program runs across multiple apps, analytics are calculated separately for each app, using each app's respective time zone.

Note:

• Once a time zone is set for a workspace or an app, it cannot be changed. This restriction ensures the integrity of historical data, as changing the time zone would shift the dates for past records and cause reporting inconsistencies.
• The app time zone also determines the date boundaries for all analytics within merchant workspaces for mini programs running in that app. Merchants cannot set or change the time zone for their reports. However, they can view the time zone used for each report.

Time zone display

The time zone in your workspace is displayed according to the following rules:

• Format: Time zones are displayed using UTC offsets. For example, UTC+08:00 (China Standard Time) or UTC-05:00 (Eastern Standard Time).
• Automatic adjustment: If the region for your workspace or app observes Daylight Saving Time (DST), the platform automatically adjusts the displayed UTC offset when the time change occurs.

How time zone settings are applied

The following table clarifies which time zone setting applies to analytics in tenant and merchant workspaces.

View time zone settings

• To view the current time zone settings for your workspace or any app, follow the instructions in View time zone settings.
• To find the time zone used for a specific report, follow the instructions in the relevant report guide:

• Dashboard statistics
• Mini program analysis
• Report