Greece Clocks Go Back Sunday: How Time Gaps With the World Change

Greece returns to winter time in the early hours of Sunday, October 25, 2026. At 4:00 a.m., clocks go back one hour to 3:00 a.m., so the night from Saturday to Sunday lasts an hour longer. The country moves from Eastern European Summer Time (UTC+3) to Eastern European Time (UTC+2), where it stays until the end of March.

The Ministry of Infrastructure and Transport confirmed the change in its yearly notice, citing EU Directive 2000/84/EC. “In the early hours of Sunday, the hands of the clocks must be moved one hour back, that is from 04:00 a.m. to 03:00 a.m.,” the ministry said.

The change itself is routine. What catches people out is that the rest of the world does not change on the same day. For one week, and in some places for the whole winter, the time difference between Greece and other countries will not be the one you are used to.

Europe Changes All at Once

Under EU rules, summer time ends at 01:00 UTC on the last Sunday of October in every member state. Because everyone switches at the same instant, the local hour differs: 2:00 a.m. in London, Dublin and Lisbon, 3:00 a.m. in Paris and Berlin, and 4:00 a.m. in Athens, Nicosia and Sofia.

So the gap with most of Europe does not move. The UK, Ireland and Portugal stay two hours behind Greece, Germany, France and Italy stay one hour behind, and Cyprus keeps the same time as Greece.

Turkey is the main exception nearby. It no longer uses daylight saving time and stays on UTC+3 all year, so from Sunday Istanbul will be one hour ahead of Athens instead of on the same time.

North America: One Odd Week, and New Rules in Canada

The United States and most of Canada end daylight saving time a week later, on Sunday, November 1, at 2:00 a.m. local time. Between October 25 and November 1, the gap between Greece and most of North America is one hour shorter than usual:

• New York, Toronto and Montreal: 6 hours behind Greece, back to 7 from November 1.

• Chicago: 7 hours behind, back to 8 from November 1.

• Los Angeles: 9 hours behind, back to 10 from November 1.

Hawaii and most of Arizona do not change their clocks, and neither does Saskatchewan, so their gap with Greece shrinks by one hour on Sunday and stays that way all winter. Phoenix, for example, will be 9 hours behind Greece.

Canada has a bigger change this year. British Columbia, Alberta and Manitoba have moved to permanent daylight time, so clocks there will not go back on November 1. B.C. now calls its zone Pacific time, fixed at UTC-7. For Greece, that means Vancouver will be 9 hours behind from Sunday, not 10, and will stay at 9 through the winter. Calgary and Edmonton will be 8 hours behind and Winnipeg 7, also all winter. Alberta notes that some older devices may not update on their own.

In the US, the House of Representatives passed a bill in July to make daylight saving time permanent, but it still needs the Senate, so the November 1 change goes ahead as usual.

Australia and the South: The Gap Grows

In the southern hemisphere the seasons run the other way. New South Wales, Victoria, South Australia, Tasmania and the ACT moved their clocks forward on October 4 for their summer. When Greece goes back an hour, the gap with them grows:

• Sydney, Melbourne, Canberra and Hobart: 9 hours ahead of Greece, up from 8.

• Adelaide: 8.5 hours ahead, up from 7.5.

• Brisbane: 8 hours ahead, up from 7 (Queensland does not use daylight saving).

• Perth: 6 hours ahead, up from 5.

These gaps hold until late March 2027. South Africa, Brazil and Argentina do not change their clocks at all, so from Sunday Johannesburg will be on the same time as Athens instead of one hour behind, while São Paulo and Buenos Aires will be 5 hours behind Greece instead of 6.

Calls, Flights and Ferries

For anyone with family, friends or work in North America, the week of October 25 is the one to watch. A regular 7:00 p.m. call from Athens reaches New York at 1:00 p.m. this week, not noon, and goes back to noon from November 1. For Australia it works the other way: a 9:00 a.m. call from Athens now reaches Sydney at 6:00 p.m., an hour later than before.

Flight, ferry and train timetables are always printed in local time, so a ferry listed for 7:30 a.m. on Sunday leaves at 7:30 a.m. winter time. The risk is in the arithmetic: a connection, an online meeting or an airport pickup arranged across time zones before the change may now be an hour off. It is worth checking any plans for this week again.

Smartphones, computers and most connected devices update by themselves. Wall clocks, watches, car dashboards, ovens and some older appliances do not, so they need to be set by hand on Sunday morning.

Darker Evenings, Lighter Mornings

The most visible change in Greece is the light. In Athens, the sun sets at about 6:35 p.m. on Saturday. On Sunday it sets at about 5:34 p.m., and by October 31 at about 5:27 p.m. Mornings get brighter in return, with sunrise moving from about 7:42 a.m. to 6:43 a.m. And on Saturday night, most people get an extra hour of sleep.

Will Europe Stop Changing the Clocks?

The European Commission proposed ending seasonal clock changes in 2018, and the European Parliament backed the idea in 2019. EU governments have still not agreed a common position, so the twice-yearly change continues. A Commission study on the effects of ending it is due by the end of 2026, as timeanddate.com reports.

For now, Greece's next clock change is on Sunday, March 28, 2027, when clocks go forward one hour.

Check out Greece in November: What It's Really Like.

Cover photo: Sunset in Athens 2026 (cropped), Acropolis hill from Lycabettus hill, by Aaaatu, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).