What happens to the time when traveling west?

When traveling west, the time gets earlier because the Earth rotates from west to east. As you move westward, you cross time zones that are set based on divisions of the Earth’s rotation. Each time zone generally represents one hour of the 24-hour day, and moving west means you are entering a new time zone where the local time is set back by one hour for each zone crossed.

For example, if it’s 3 PM in New York City (Eastern Time) and you travel to California (Pacific Time), you would experience the local time shift to 12 PM. This indicates that traveling west effectively makes you experience "earlier" time events in the day compared to the time zones you are moving from.

The concept of time zones reflects how society measures time based on Earth's rotation, so with each westward movement across a time zone, you adjust your clock backward, therefore it is correct to say that time gets earlier.