Daylight saving time ends this Sunday at 2 a.m., so be sure to set your clocks back one hour before bedtime tonight. The good news is that we gain an extra hour of sleep! However, the bad news is that it will start to get dark in the late afternoon for the next few months. As we shift back to standard time, the days will feel shorter. Looking ahead, we’ll spring forward again on March 8, 2026.
The biannual clock change, forward in spring and backward in fall, is designed to maximize daylight, offering brighter mornings in the winter and longer evenings in the summer. While most of the U.S. observes this shift, Hawaii, most of Arizona, and U.S. territories such as Puerto Rico and Guam do not participate.
Daylight saving time (DST) runs from March to November, when clocks are set an hour ahead to make better use of natural light. The tradition began in the U.S. in 1918, introduced by the Standard Time Act as a World War I energy-saving measure. Although it was briefly discontinued after the war, DST was reintroduced during later national emergencies and eventually standardized under the Uniform Time Act of 1966. In 2005, Congress extended the period to its current schedule, starting the second Sunday in March and ending the first Sunday in November, again citing energy conservation.
This year’s end to daylight saving time comes one day earlier than last year, landing on the second-earliest possible date. Since daylight saving time ends on the first Sunday in November, the earliest possible date for the time change is November 1.
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