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The world’s timekeepers have voted to stop adding leap seconds, citing the risk of disruption to connected devices and critical infrastructure. The change replaces occasional one-second adjustments with a system that lets Coordinated Universal Time drift further from Earth’s rotation before correction is needed.

What happened At its 28th meeting, the General Conference on Weights and Measures voted to end the introduction of leap seconds, The Register reports. Leap seconds have been used to keep Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) aligned with time calculated from Earth’s changing rotation. The report says the replacement, called Continuous UTC, allows the gap between UTC and Earth-rotation time to grow to as much as 3,600 seconds. It is due to come into force next year. The organisation’s resolution cited the possibility of a negative leap second, which has never been applied, as a high risk for infrastructure not prepared to handle one. Why it matters

Discuss: Should global time standards prioritise keeping clocks close to Earth’s rotation, or making life simpler for the systems that depend on them?

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