It seems Earth was as eager to end 2020 as many of us.

The planet experienced 28 of its fastest days ever last year, according to timeanddate.com.

The time it takes Earth to complete a rotation on its axis is 24 hours – or 86,400 seconds (and yes, for you Broadway musical fans, it takes 525,600 minutes to orbit the sun).

But factors such as atmospheric pressure, ocean currents, wind and movement of the planet's molten core can speed up or slow down that spin each day.

We're talking milliseconds, but they can add up, and that knocks ultra-accurate atomic clocks out of sync with astronomical time.

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The atomic clocks are used to set Coordinated Universal Time (UTC), which is basically how everyone on the planet agrees what time it is.

When the atomic clocks deviate from astronomical time by more than 0.4 seconds, UTC has to be adjusted, according to Live Science.

Beginning in the 1970s, scientists added a leap second at the end of June or December in years when an adjustment was required. Time was added because the Earth's rotation has tended to be slower.

The last time a leap second was added was on New Year's Eve in 2016 (every four years, a leap day is added on Feb. 29 to keep our calendars in sync with the astronomical year).

Now, the world's official timekeepers are considering subtracting a leap second because the Earth's rotation is speeding up.

The planet broke the record for the shortest astronomical day 28 times last year. Until 2020, the shortest day had been July 5, 2005, when Earth completed a rotation 1.0516 milliseconds faster than 86,400 seconds.

The shortest day last year was 1.4602 milliseconds faster than 86,400 seconds.

And scientists say shorter days will continue this year. An average day in 2021 will be 0.05 milliseconds shorter than 86,400 seconds, according to timeanddate.com. By the end of the year, atomic clocks could be 19 milliseconds slower than astronomical time.

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