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Mac keep reverting to wrong date & time

My 15" 2018 MBP has an issue with setting date and time automatically. Since the last two/three days the clock keep reverting to February 2022 (today is November 12, 2023). I have recently upgraded to 14.1.1, and have already tried resetting the SMC and NVRAM to no avail. Setting the clock through Terminal using "sudo sntp -Ss time.apple.com" work fine to set the clock, but the systems keeps resetting to February 2022 during the day. For now I have turned off "Set date & Time Automatically" in system settings and that keeps the clock set to the correct time. However I would like to ensure the time is set automatically to avoid me setting time 'all the time' as inevitably the clock will drift at some point.

MacBook Pro 15″, macOS 14.1

Posted on Nov 14, 2023 1:13 AM

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Posted on Dec 26, 2023 12:34 PM

was able to fix it following Luis Sequiera1’s instructions but for those who have brain farts like me, here’s a bit more detail:


1 Open Terminal app (go to Finder > Applications > Utilities > Terminal) and type the following:

sudo rm /var/db/timed/com.apple.timed.plist


2 Press Return. You will be prompted to enter your password. You will not see the password as it is being typed.


3 Press Return to run the command (you won’t see anything change on the screen, but it’s working its magic)


4 Restart the Mac

5 Go to System Settings > General > Date & Time > Set time and date automatically (I had to click on 24-hour time, which is what I originally had it on - and voi la!)

56 replies

Jan 5, 2024 10:24 AM in response to awilso12

I JUST had the same issue with my 2020 Air, too. Please be sure to verify that it isn't user specific. In order to do this, create a guest account and restart your computer. If you log into the guest account and the time is still off, there is an issue with your user profile. Unfortunately, I went to the Apple Store and spent an hour with a genius trying to narrow it down (at that point I was on the Beta software and reverted to the public software with the same issue). The only solution was to format my device and start over from a backup. After the factory reset, it was working as intended.


It's been about a month or so, and the issue came back. I tried the terminal commands "sudo rm /var/db/timed/com.apple.timed.plist", reset my computer twice. It now works.



You can also try different servers (time.google.com, etc.)


Best of luck :)

Jan 9, 2024 6:08 PM in response to Ir. Bob

I just had this same issue! The date and time was reading as January 2 around 3:30pm (it was 7:40pm). When I played around with the date and time in settings by unchecking and rechecking the “automatic” button, it set itself to October 31, 2021 at 1:19pm. I assume because of this, I lost all connection to the internet and couldn’t even use my phone as a hotspot. A screenshot I took was additionally named with the October 2021 date and time. When I managed to manually reset the date and time to be correct, I was able to use the internet again. Out of curiosity, I re-checked the “automatic” button and it remained accurate. What a strange glitch!

Mac keep reverting to wrong date & time

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