The Clocks Will Change This Weekend

In case the gloomy, wet weather hasn’t clued you in, British summer time is drawing to an end for another year. Here’s what you need to know about when the clocks will change – and why.

When Do The Clocks Change In Autumn 2024?

The clocks will change at 2am on Sunday 27 October 2024. The time will ‘fall back’ by one hour, meaning 1am will happen twice and we will all get an extra hour in bed. Your phone and most electronic devices connected to the internet will change automatically, but you will have to change any manual clocks and watches yourself.

Earlier this year, the clocks ‘sprang forward’ one hour; this happened during the early hours of Sunday 31 March 2024, the beginning of British Summer Time or ‘daylight saving’.

Interestingly, we spend most of the year (around seven months) in British Summer Time (BST), despite our traditional time zone being Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) one hour earlier. We spend the winter months in GMT, spanning the last Sunday of October until the last Sunday of March.

Why Do The Clocks Change?

In the UK, we change our clocks twice a year to make better use of the daylight during the winter months.

In moving the clocks an hour ahead in March, we move an hour of sunlight from the morning to the evening, meaning the sun sets later than it normally would. Meanwhile, moving the clocks backwards in October shifts an hour of sunlight from the evening to the morning, making for brighter mornings during the darker season.

The practice in the UK dates back to 1907, when William Willett published a pamphlet titled ‘The Waste of Daylight’ – but we wouldn’t implement his ideas until 1916, along with many other nations involved in WWI, the first being Germany. During WWII, the UK introduced ‘British Double Summer Time’, switching the clocks forward by two hours instead of just one hour to increase productivity. In the winter, the clocks were kept one hour ahead of GMT.

While it stops us sleeping through some of our precious daylight hours during the winter, daylight savings has always been a controversial practice. Many people believe we should ditch GMT entirely and operate on BST throughout the year, or adopt British Double Summer Time in the summer months and BST in the winter. This would save energy and increase daylight in the evenings, but opponents point out the sun therefore would rise much later in the north of the nation (not until 10am in the far northwest of Scotland) – meaning children would travel to and from school in darkness.

What Other Countries Use Daylight Saving?

Around 70 countries across the globe adopt daylight saving, including all 27 EU member states (apart from Iceland) and 48 of the USA’s 50 states (Hawaii and Arizona do not partake). Countries closer to the equator generally don’t use daylight savings as there is little variation in the length of the day across the year.

Future Dates To Know

In 2025, the clocks will spring forward on Sunday 30 March, and fall back on Sunday 26 October in the UK.

In 2026, the clocks will spring forward on Sunday 29 March, and fall back on Sunday 25 October in the UK.

In the US, the clocks spring forward on the second Sunday of March and fall back on the first Sunday of November.