The switch to winter time — a five-day plan

On the night of Saturday 24 to Sunday 25 October the clocks go back an hour — 3:00 becomes 2:00. Formally we gain an hour of sleep, which is why this change is considered the easier one. In practice the autumn change can be harder than the spring one, just in a different way.

Because the problem is not that one hour. The problem is what happens to the evening.

Overnight, sunset jumps to before half past four. If you finish work at 17:00, from Monday you come home in the dark, and that continues until mid-February. This is a real change, not a matter of getting used to it — the light signal that sets your circadian rhythm disappears from the end of the day.

What the research says about the autumn change

The most interesting work here is the analysis by Kantermann and colleagues published in Current Biology in 2007. The researchers tracked circadian rhythm for several weeks around both transitions and showed that adaptation to the autumn change does not happen by simply catching up on sleep. The seasonal rhythm, which normally drifts with the seasons, is thrown out of step with social time after the clock change — most strongly in late chronotypes, that is, people who already prefer going to bed later.

A Danish analysis by Hansen and colleagues from 2017, published in Epidemiology, covered more than 185,000 cases and found roughly an 11 percent rise in diagnosed depressive episodes in the weeks immediately after the switch to winter time, fading over about ten weeks. The authors attribute this primarily to the abrupt shift in evening light rather than to losing or gaining an hour. This is population data — it says nothing about any individual and is no cause for alarm, but it does explain why the end of October is hard for many people.

The practical implication: the goal is not to sleep through the change. The goal is to manage light.

A five-day plan — for adults

The principle is the reverse of the spring change. Because the clock goes back an hour, the new seven o'clock is the old eight. To avoid waking at five from Monday onwards, you need to shift gradually later, not earlier.

If a five-day operation is more than you want, do the minimum: on Sunday get up at your normal time and go for a walk. That single act handles most of it.

Light — the only lever that really works

The scale is worth knowing. On an overcast October day, outdoors gives between one thousand and several thousand lux. A well-lit office gives 300 to 500. A living room in the evening rarely exceeds 100. For the system that sets circadian rhythm, this is not a difference of degree but of kind: indoors simply reads as night.

Three practical things:

• Morning: in the first hour after waking, open the curtains and turn on the overhead light. If you leave the house, walk the first ten minutes.
• During the day: move one activity outdoors. A phone call, a coffee, the school run — anything, as long as it is outside the building and before three o'clock.
• Evening: after 20:00 dim the overhead light and switch to floor lamps. This is not about blue light from screens — it is about the total amount of light in the room, which matters far more than its colour.

Children — a separate plan, started earlier

A small child does not understand that the clock has moved and cannot adapt by willpower. Their rhythm is more rigid than an adult's, so the shift has to be slower.

1. Nine days before: move bath, dinner and bedtime 10 minutes later every second day. By Sunday that adds up to an hour.
2. Keep the same sequence of activities throughout — bath, pyjamas, book, lights out. A child navigates by order, not by the clock.
3. Blacking out the room in the morning matters more than in the evening. After the change it gets light at six, and that is the most common cause of early waking in November.
4. Do not shorten the nap on shifting days — an overtired child falls asleep worse, not better.
5. The first week after the change may be disordered, and that is normal. Return to fixed times and give it seven days.

What not to do

• Do not sleep the extra hour off on Sunday. This is the most common mistake — getting up an hour later on Sunday undoes the whole effect and moves the problem to Monday.
• Do not go to bed early because “it is dark”. Dark at 16:30 does not mean the body is ready at 21:00. Lying down too early ends in tossing and turning and waking at four.
• Do not count on alcohol. It eases falling asleep and breaks up the second half of the night — precisely the half that is most fragile when your rhythm is shifted.
• Do not change three things at once. If you turn on the heating, switch to winter bedding and move the clock in the same week, you will not know what worked.

Will the clock change be abolished at all?

The European Parliament voted to end seasonal clock changes in March 2019. Since then the matter has sat with the Council of the European Union, because member states have not agreed which time should become permanent — and above all because neighbouring countries do not want to end up in different zones. Until such an agreement, the change stands. The practical conclusion for 2026: the clocks go back as usual.

Frequently asked questions

Summary

On 25 October the clocks go back and we gain an hour, but we lose an hour of evening light — sunset moves to 16:17. Research shows adaptation is not about catching up on sleep but about organising light exposure. Adults need only shift 20 minutes later for three days beforehand and get up at their normal time on Sunday. Children need nine days at 10-minute steps and a properly blacked-out window in the morning. The worst thing you can do is sleep that extra hour off on Sunday.

Sources

• Kantermann T. et al., “The human circadian clock's seasonal adjustment is disrupted by daylight saving time”, Current Biology 2007;17(22):1996–2000
• Hansen B.T. et al., “Daylight savings time transitions and the incidence rate of unipolar depressive episodes”, Epidemiology 2017;28(3):346–353
• Directive on discontinuing seasonal changes of time — European Parliament position of March 2019, procedure still before the Council of the EU
• Sunrise and sunset times for Warsaw, October 2026

See also

• Racing thoughts at night What to do at three in the morning
• Aura Kids For the child who takes the change worst
• Weight calculator Find your weight in a minute

This article is informational and concerns sleep comfort and general wellbeing. A weighted blanket is not a medical device and does not replace consultation with a specialist.