Spain will put the clocks back in the early hours of Sunday, 25 October 2026, switching to winter time . On the mainland and in the Balearic Islands clocks go back from 03.00 to 02.00, and in the Canary Islands from 02.00 to 01.00. The day will therefore officially last 25 hours.
The legal basis is Spain’s implementation of the European framework on clock changes. The Boletín Oficial del Estado has set the calendar for summer-time periods from 2022 to 2026 through the Orden PCM/186/2022 . Under this, the end of summer time falls on the last Sunday in October in every year of this period. In 2026, this is 25 October. The relevant instrument remains Directive 2000/84/EC, under which Member States make the twice-yearly switch between summer time and winter time.
The immediate effect of the change is that it will be light earlier in the morning and dark earlier in the evening from that date. For timetables, shift schedules and automated processes, the extra hour that night means that time slots may occur twice. Transport operators, energy suppliers and critical infrastructure operators plan the change in advance to avoid overlaps in overnight operations. Households should note that some devices will not update to the new time automatically.
The political debate over abolishing the twice-yearly clock change has been under way in Europe for years. However, the European Union has still not adopted a unified decision to keep summer time or standard time permanently. Spain will therefore continue to follow the existing rule for the time being: summer time ends on the last Sunday in October, and winter time runs from the last weekend in October to the last weekend in March.
For Spain, the next key date is therefore 25 October 2026. The change follows the European timetable and the dates published in the Boletín Oficial del Estado. Businesses and public bodies are adapting their technical and organisational processes; for the public, the main change is to the daily rhythm, with dusk coming earlier in the evening.
Editor: Mira Cadena (Article created with AI assistance).