Pilot Time vs UTC Orbit
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Pilot Time
Instantly view local, military, and UTC time with a tap. Developed by pilots, this app eliminates mental time conversions by displaying current and past/future times across various time zones. Easily select continents and cities for quick comparisons.
- View local, military, and UTC time
- Compare current location time to UTC
- Display frequently used time zones
- Convert past, current, and future times
- Easy continent and city time zone selection
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Stop converting time in your head! See local, military, and UTC time (GMT and Zulu time zones) with a tap. Developed by pilots who can never remember the current UTC (GMT/Zulu) time conversion, Pilot Time instantly gives you the current time and date for your zone, plus UTC time. Pilot Time can: - Compare the time and date at your current location (in 12-hour format and 24-hour format) to UTC time. - Show the 3 time zones you looked at most recently, plus UTC time. - Quickly convert any past, current, or future time to or from any time zone (including GMT). And selecting time zones is easy: first find the continent, then the city you want. No more mental calculations. (The time is provided by your phone's operating system, not a central server. Time zones are taken from the IANA Time Zone Database.)
UTC Orbit
This utility converts between human-readable dates and a YYDDD.FFFFFF format essential for spacecraft orbital element calculations. It also features a UTC alarm clock based on the day of the year and a large digit UTC display.
- UTC time conversion
- YYDDD.FFFFFF format display
- UTC alarm clock
- Day of Year alarm setting
- Large digit UTC clock display
- Background alarm notifications
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UTC Orbit; is a time conversion utility for use with Earth orbital elements calculations for spacecraft. The application also contains a UTC alarm clock that is based on "Day of Year". UTC stands for "Universal Time Coordinated", but is also known as Zulu Time or GMT Time. The application allows the user to select any epoch time in the future or past via pick wheels and that time is then displayed as YYDDD.FFFFFF where YY=Two digit year, where DDD=day of the year (000 - 366), and where .FFFFFF is the decimal fraction of the day. This is the standard format for manipulation of spacecraft tracking TLE's (Two Line Element sets). The app also works in reverse where the user types in the epoch time and the pick wheels will spin to the human readable date. The alarm is set via the pick wheels and operates in the background for sound and screen notification as well as the foreground if application is running. The user must "allow notifications" for the background to function. A useful feature of the app is that if you rotate the iPhone you then have a large digit UTC clock. iPad large digit clock is selected by touching the button "UTC screen". Note that this locks the screen rotation on all devices and to return to the calculation screen you must touch "Back to main screen".
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: UTC Orbit at 5.0 against Pilot Time's 4.5. UTC Orbit also leads on review sentiment (100% vs 73%). Pilot Time's advantage is ratings volume (19 vs 2) and iOS requirement (13.0 vs 26.0). On price, update cadence, ads and in-app purchases there is nothing between them.
Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
UTC Orbit holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 4.5. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Pilot Time has 19 ratings behind it against 2, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 73% of Pilot Time's written reviews are positive against 100% of UTC Orbit's.
Pilot Time ships an update every 6 months, UTC Orbit every 8 months. The most recent releases landed on September 30, 2026 and September 15, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Pilot Time | UTC Orbit |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.5 (19 ratings) | 5.0 (2 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 73.2% of reviews | 100.0% of reviews — better |
| Number of ratings | 19 — better | 2 |
| Update frequency | Every 6 months — better | Every 8 months |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPod | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 13.0 — better | 26.0 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 6 MB | 2 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | WillowRoot Apps, LLC. | Dave Massey |
Customer experience
Pilot Time
UTC Orbit
Bugs and requests
Pilot Time
Reported bugs
9 issues- App crashes upon opening after updates
- Widget displays 'UNABLE TO LOAD' error
- App crashes when changing time zones
- Incorrect time zone offsets for some locations (e.g., Sydney)
- Time doesn't update when app is reopened
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- Incorrect time zone naming conventions
- Incompatibility with iOS 18 widgets
- 12-hour clock incorrectly identifies noon as AM
- App freezes on startup with certain iOS versions
Requested features
11 requests- Favorites or saved locations tab
- Flight time and air time calculator
- Julian date display for each time zone
- GPS location detection for automatic time zone
- Multiple simultaneous time zone display (3-4 zones)
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- 24-hour format option only
- Search cities by typing functionality
- State listings for US locations
- Flight forecast hour conversion chart
- Decimal format for logbook entries
- Ability to set custom background images
UTC Orbit
Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.
In-app purchases
Pilot Time
No in-app purchases
UTC Orbit
No in-app purchases







