Forex market hours and session overlaps
Currency trading runs around the clock on weekdays, handed from Sydney to Tokyo to London to New York. The London and New York sessions overlap from 12:00 to 16:00 UTC, which is the deepest liquidity of the day. All times below adjust for daylight saving in each financial centre.
How to use this
- Each bar is one session’s hours placed on a single UTC day.
- The strip underneath counts how many sessions trade in each hour; amber marks the overlaps, where liquidity is deepest.
- Times shift with daylight saving in each financial centre, so the picture changes a few times a year.
Worth knowing: Forex has no central exchange and no opening bell. These are the conventional local hours of each centre, not an official schedule.
Amber marks hours when two or more sessions trade at once. Peak overlap at 00:00 UTC.
The relay that never stops
Currencies have no central exchange, so the market is wherever the banks are awake. That turns the trading day into a relay: Sydney opens the week, Tokyo picks it up, London takes over as Asia winds down, and New York carries it to the close. Because the handovers are geographic rather than scheduled, the market runs continuously from Monday morning in Australia to Friday evening in America.
Sydney, 07:00 to 16:00 local, 21:00 to 06:00 UTC today. Opens the trading week. Thin liquidity, and the first market to react to weekend news.
Tokyo, 09:00 to 18:00 local, 00:00 to 09:00 UTC today. The Asian session proper. Yen crosses and Asia-Pacific pairs are at their most active.
London, 08:00 to 17:00 local, 07:00 to 16:00 UTC today. The largest session by volume. Europe's open sets the tone for the rest of the day.
New York, 08:00 to 17:00 local, 12:00 to 21:00 UTC today. US data lands here, and its first hours overlap London, which is the busiest window of all.
The overlaps matter more than the sessions themselves. When London and New York are both trading, from 12:00 to 16:00 UTC, roughly half the world's currency volume is active at once: spreads tighten, moves get larger, and most economic releases are timed into it. The quiet stretch after New York closes and before Sydney opens is the mirror image, and a poor time to expect a clean fill.
One detail that catches people out: these windows drift. Each centre keeps its own local hours, and the southern hemisphere changes its clocks in the opposite season to the north, so for a few weeks each year the gaps between sessions widen or shrink. The bars above are computed from live timezone data rather than fixed UTC times, so they follow those shifts instead of quietly going wrong.
Sources and last check
Times, offsets and sun positions on this page are computed live from the IANA timezone database and the NOAA solar algorithm, so they do not depend on the review dates below.
- Trading sessions for 16 stock exchanges
- Source: Each exchange's published trading-hours page. Last checked, reviewed every 6 months.
Not covered:Regular weekly schedule only. Public holidays, half days and unscheduled halts are not modelled.
FAQ
When do the forex sessions overlap?
London and New York overlap from 12:00 to 16:00 UTC, the busiest window of the trading day. Sydney and Tokyo overlap earlier, which is when Asia-Pacific pairs are most active.
Is the forex market really open 24 hours?
On weekdays, effectively yes. It opens with Sydney on Monday morning local time and closes after New York on Friday afternoon, with no central exchange in between. It does close over the weekend.
Do these hours change with daylight saving?
Yes, and not all at once. Each financial centre keeps its own local hours, and the northern and southern hemispheres change clocks in opposite seasons, so the gaps between sessions shift a few times a year. The times here are computed live from each city's timezone.