What Time Does the Stock Market Close? The Complete Guide
The US stock market — the NYSE and the Nasdaq — closes at 4:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday. But that is only the regular session. Trading also happens before the opening bell and after the closing bell, the market shuts completely on holidays and weekends, and 4 p.m. Eastern is breakfast or dinner depending on your time zone. Here is the full picture, so you always know when you can act.
Key takeaways
- 4:00 p.m. ET, Monday–Friday is the regular close for the NYSE and Nasdaq. The market opens at 9:30 a.m. ET.
- Extended hours run 4:00–9:30 a.m. ET (pre-market) and 4:00–8:00 p.m. ET (after-hours) — thinner trading, wider spreads.
- The market is fully closed weekends and on nine federal-style holidays, with early 1 p.m. closes on a few half-days.
- The 4 p.m. close drives the closing auction, market-on-close orders, mutual-fund prices and T+1 settlement.
- Futures and forex trade around the clock — they do not observe the 4 p.m. close.
The short answer: 4:00 p.m. Eastern
Both major US stock exchanges — the New York Stock Exchange and the Nasdaq — run their regular trading session from 9:30 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Eastern Time, Monday through Friday. Times are always quoted in Eastern because both exchanges sit in New York. The NYSE’s official hours and holidays calendar is the definitive reference if you ever need to double-check a date.
Why 4 p.m.? It is simply where history landed — the trading day once ran 10 a.m. to 3 p.m., stretched to 4 p.m. decades ago, and the close now anchors everything from fund pricing to the evening news. Knowing the exact minute matters because orders placed after 4:00 p.m. wait for the next session.
The full trading day: three sessions, not one
The 9:30-to-4:00 window is the regular session, but electronic venues trade far longer. Most brokers offer two extended sessions:
| Session | Hours (ET) | What to know |
|---|---|---|
| Pre-market | 4:00 a.m. – 9:30 a.m. | React to overnight news and earnings; low volume, wider spreads |
| Regular session | 9:30 a.m. – 4:00 p.m. | Full liquidity; when most volume and price discovery happens |
| After-hours | 4:00 p.m. – 8:00 p.m. | Trade on late earnings; same thin-trading cautions as pre-market |
Extended hours come with real trade-offs. With fewer buyers and sellers, prices can swing on small orders and the gap between bid and ask widens — Schwab’s extended-hours explainer notes that most brokers restrict these sessions to limit orders for exactly this reason. The NYSE Arca page confirms its electronic market spans the same extended window. Note your broker’s own windows may be narrower than the exchange’s — check before assuming you can trade at 5 a.m.
Weekends and holidays: when everything stops
The market is closed every Saturday and Sunday, and on nine holidays a year. Orders you place while it is closed simply queue for the next open. The 2026 closures:
- January 1 — New Year’s Day
- January 19 — Martin Luther King, Jr. Day
- February 16 — Presidents’ Day
- April 3 — Good Friday
- May 25 — Memorial Day
- June 19 — Juneteenth National Independence Day
- July 3 — Independence Day observed (July 4 falls on a Saturday)
- September 7 — Labor Day
- November 26 — Thanksgiving Day
- December 25 — Christmas Day
There are also early closes at 1:00 p.m. ET on a few days — traditionally the Friday after Thanksgiving (November 27 in 2026). On those days the regular close moves, so same-day plans should move with it. Again, the NYSE calendar is the final word.
What 4 p.m. ET means in your time zone
US time zones shift together (all four observe daylight saving), so the conversion never changes:
| Time zone | Market opens | Market closes |
|---|---|---|
| Eastern (ET) | 9:30 a.m. | 4:00 p.m. |
| Central (CT) | 8:30 a.m. | 3:00 p.m. |
| Mountain (MT) | 7:30 a.m. | 2:00 p.m. |
| Pacific (PT) | 6:30 a.m. | 1:00 p.m. |
West Coast investors effectively trade through lunch; East Coast investors get a full workday. Outside the US, the equivalents move twice a year with daylight-saving changes on each side — a Londoner trades 2:30–9:00 p.m. in winter and 2:30–9:00 p.m. shifts slightly in summer, so confirm around the March and November transitions. (For where market hours fit into your money routine, see our personal finance primer.)
Why the close matters more than you think
4:00 p.m. is not just when the screens go quiet — it drives several mechanics investors rely on:
- The closing auction. From 3:50 p.m., the NYSE matches the day’s closing-price orders in an auction that sets the official close price for listed stocks — the single most-traded moment of the day.
- Market-on-close orders. MOC orders guarantee execution at (or near) the official closing price, letting funds and index trackers trade without moving the market.
- Mutual-fund pricing. Mutual funds strike their net asset value once daily, at 4:00 p.m. ET — buy or sell during the day and you get the price set at the close.
- T+1 settlement. Stock trades now settle the next business day — a sale made Monday at 3:59 p.m. settles Tuesday; one made at 4:01 p.m. rolls to Wednesday. The close is the cutoff.
Markets that do not sleep at 4 p.m.
The equity close does not stop everything. Futures on indexes, commodities and currencies trade nearly around the clock — roughly Sunday evening through Friday evening, with a short daily maintenance halt. Foreign exchange is a 24-hour market, five days a week, closing only on weekends. That is why overseas headlines can move S&P 500 futures overnight while your brokerage app sits dark.
For a long-term investor, these markets are mostly background noise — you cannot and should not react to them at 2 a.m. Knowing they exist explains why prices sometimes jump between the close and the next morning’s open. Our investment strategies guide covers what to do instead: a steady, boring system that ignores the overnight drama.
Try it yourself
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Read the investment strategies guideSources & further reading
Hours, holidays and session definitions from the exchanges; all conversions are our own.
- NYSE — Hours and Holidays CalendarThe official reference: regular hours, the 2026 holiday closures and early-close dates.
- NYSE — NYSE ArcaThe all-electronic exchange’s session hours, which span pre-market through after-hours.
- Charles Schwab — Extended Hours TradingA broker’s plain-English guide to the risks of trading before the open and after the close.