Daylight saving time ends November 1, 2026: move your bedtime 15 minutes at a time

What actually happens on November 1

Daylight saving time in the United States begins at 2:00 a.m. on the second Sunday of March and ends at 2:00 a.m. on the first Sunday of November (Energy Policy Act of 2005; 15 U.S.C. 260a). In 2026 that puts the fall change on Sunday, November 1, 2026: 2:00 am becomes 1:00 am, and the hour between 1:00 and 2:00 runs twice. Sunrise and sunset both arrive an hour earlier by the clock from that morning on. Your body does not read the clock, so on Sunday it is ready for bed at what the clock now calls an hour early, and it wakes an hour early too. Someone with a 6:30 am alarm tends to surface around 5:30 am.

Not everyone changes. Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Arizona (except the Navajo Nation, which does change) stay on standard time all year. The clocks go forward again on Sunday, March 14, 2027; the planner above handles that one as well, with every step reversed.

Why fifteen minutes a night

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine's advice for both changes is the same size of step: move bedtime 15 to 20 minutes a night for a few nights, later in the fall and earlier in the spring, and move meals and other daily routines along with it. A full hour in one night is a small dose of jet lag; four quarter-hours are small enough that most people fall asleep at the new time without lying awake. The table below shows what each step size costs in nights for the fall 2026 change, using a 10:45 pm bedtime.

Nights = 60 ÷ step, rounded up · dates count back from Saturday, October 31 · step range from AASM Sleep Education

Light does most of the work. Bright light in the evening pushes the body clock later and bright light in the morning pulls it earlier, which is why the AASM tells people to get outside early on the Sunday after the spring change. For the fall change the useful direction is the opposite one in the days before: keep evenings bright, keep the bedroom dark at dawn. After the change, morning light arrives an hour sooner by the clock, so an uncovered window will wake an early riser earlier still.

"Fall back" is not a free hour

The spring change has the worse record. In US time-use data, people slept 40 minutes less on the Monday after it. A study of 732,835 fatal crashes from 1996 to 2017 found the risk of a fatal crash up 6% in the week after the spring change, and a Michigan hospital registry recorded 24% more heart-attack admissions on that Monday.

The fall change looks gentler in the same data: the crash study found no effect, the workplace study found no significant difference in sleep or injuries, and heart-attack admissions were 21% lower on the Tuesday after, with the weekly total unchanged. But gentler is not the same as a gain. A review of the sleep studies found little evidence that people sleep longer on the night the clocks go back, and then about five days of earlier-than-usual rising, a net loss across the week. That is the pattern parents of small children and natural early birds already know: the clock says 5:30, the body says morning.

Before or after: which plan fits

Shifting before the change means that for 4 nights you go to bed and get up a little later than usual, and on Sunday the clock catches up with you. With the example times that is lights out at 11:00 pm, 11:15 pm, 11:30 pm and 11:45 pm, then 10:45 pm on the new clock. It suits anyone whose mornings have slack, and children who are not yet in school. The catch is the alarm: it moves later on working days too, which a fixed start time will not allow.

Shifting after the change keeps the week before untouched. From Sunday night you go to bed at 10:00 pm by the new clock, which your body still reads as 11:00 pm, and you add fifteen minutes a night until you are back at 10:45 pm. Mornings start early (5:45 am on Monday) and move later each day. Nothing in this version makes you late, which is why it is the safer pick for a fixed schedule. The spring change turns both plans around: every step is earlier, and the "before" plan is the one that never asks for a later alarm.

Night-shift and rotating-shift workers can use the same planner by entering the bedtime and alarm they actually keep; the arithmetic does not care that the night is in the daytime. If the change falls inside a shift, the shift itself is an hour longer in the fall and an hour shorter in the spring.

What is in the calendar file

The button under the table downloads a standard .ics file with one all-day note on the day of the change and two entries per night: lights out, with a reminder 30 minutes ahead, and the alarm that follows. Times are written as plain local times with no time zone attached, so a reminder for 11:00 pm fires at 11:00 pm on your phone on either side of the change. To undo it, delete the entries; they are ordinary calendar events and nothing else is installed. For the bedtime itself on any other night, the bedtime calculator counts back from your alarm in 90-minute cycles, and the caffeine cutoff pages explain the six-hour "last coffee" column.

Questions people ask

When exactly do the clocks change in fall 2026?

At 2:00 am local time on Sunday, November 1, 2026, the clock goes back to 1:00 am. The rule is the first Sunday of November; the next change after that is Sunday, March 14, 2027, when 2:00 am becomes 3:00 am.

Do I really get an extra hour of sleep?

On paper, yes. In practice a 2013 review of the sleep studies found little evidence of extra sleep that night, and people then got up earlier than usual for about five days, which adds up to a small net loss across the week. That early waking is what the 15-minute plan is for.

Is it better to shift before or after the change?

Before, if your mornings can move: by Sunday you are already on the new clock. After, if your alarm is fixed by work or school: the "after" plan never asks for a later alarm in the fall. The calculator flags the workday mornings where each plan conflicts with your usual alarm.

Will my phone change by itself?

Phones, computers and most smart watches do. Ovens, microwaves, car clocks and wall clocks usually do not. The AASM's advice is to set those on Saturday evening so that Sunday morning starts on the right time.

Which places do not change clocks?

Hawaii, American Samoa, Guam, Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands and Arizona (except the Navajo Nation, which does change) stay on standard time all year, according to NIST. If you live there, nothing moves on November 1.

Is the calendar file really free?

Yes. The button downloads an .ics file built from the times on your screen. There is no email form and nothing is stored; the file is generated when you tap the button.