Clocks go back on 25 October: what changes in the Canary Islands
Summer time ends in the early hours of Sunday 25 October 2026. In the Canary Islands, 2:00 becomes 1:00; on the Spanish mainland, 3:00 becomes 2:00, and both changes happen at the very same moment. According to Spain's official gazette (BOE), the day officially lasts 25 hours. If you're on holiday here, you get an extra hour in bed, but a few things are worth thinking through in advance.
Exactly when, and by how much
Canary Islands: on Sunday 25 October at 2:00, the clocks go back one hour, to 1:00.
Spanish mainland and Balearic Islands: at the same moment, 3:00 becomes 2:00.
Rest of the EU: at the same instant too; in Hungary, for example, clocks also go from 3:00 to 2:00. Under the EU directive, summer time ends simultaneously in every member state, on the last Sunday of October at 1:00 Universal Time (UTC).
In other words, the gap between the Canary Islands and the Spanish mainland, which runs on Central European Time, stays at one hour after the change: when it's 12:00 in Madrid, it's 11:00 here.
What to watch out for
Phone and watch: Apple and Android both recommend keeping automatic date and time switched on, so the device changes by itself. On iPhone: Settings, General, Date & Time, Set Automatically. On Android, in the Clock app: change date and time, then turn on automatic date and time. Wall clocks and car clocks won't change by themselves.
Flights: according to Aena's airport flight information, all times shown are local times. If you're flying out or landing in the early hours of Sunday, also confirm your flight time with the airline, as Aena itself recommends.
Online admin and appointments: in the electronic systems of the Spanish public administration, deadlines are counted by the official date and time of the website concerned. When you look at an online appointment or deadline, check which time zone it's given in.
Radio, TV, live broadcasts: for decades Spanish radio stations have added "una hora menos en Canarias", one hour less in the Canaries, to the time signal. For a national programme, a match or an online event, it's also worth checking which time it's given in.
Earlier dusk: after the change it gets dark earlier. What that means for hiking and stargazing is covered in our October guide: Canary Islands in October: what to expect.
Why it's an hour behind here
Spain's legal time was introduced by a royal decree in 1900, but it said nothing about the Canary Islands. According to a study by Spain's National Geographic Institute (IGN), before 1922 different times were in use across the islands, even within the same town. Order finally came thanks to repeated questions in 1921 from the British Admiralty, which wanted to know the official time in the Canaries.
The royal decree of 11 February 1922 (published in the Gaceta de Madrid on 12 February) ruled that from 1 March the public services of the Canary Islands would run on their own time zone, one hour behind the mainland. The difference has been there ever since.
The twist came in 1940. An order dated 7 March 1940 moved the clocks forward 60 minutes "temporarily", and they were never put back. That put the mainland on Central European Time (UTC+1) and the Canary Islands in time zone 0. According to the IGN, since 1940 the Canaries have also been running ahead of what their geographical position would justify. So "una hora menos" is really one hour more than geography would give. Today the islands keep the same time as Portugal, the United Kingdom and Ireland.
Will the clocks keep changing?
For now, yes. On 26 March 2019 the European Parliament voted by 410 to 192, with 51 abstentions, to scrap the clock change from 2021 and let each country decide which time to keep. The European Commission's public consultation drew some 4.6 million responses, 84 percent of them in favour of ending the change.
The Council, which represents the member states, has however not reached a common position even after six years, according to the Parliament's October 2025 briefing. On 20 October 2025, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez brought up ending the change again, saying what matters is not whether summer or winter time stays, but that the switching stops. According to the Parliament's legislative tracker, the Commission has decided to carry out a detailed study to support a future decision.
Meanwhile, on 18 March 2026 the EU published the calendar of clock changes for 2027 to 2031. So next year, in 2027, the clocks change on 28 March and 31 October.
And if the clock change does end one day? In the Canary Islands that's a separate question. Cristina Valido, Coalición Canaria's spokesperson in the Spanish Congress, put it this way in 2025: not changing the clocks is one thing, the islands keeping their time difference is another. Whether "una hora menos en Canarias" will stay as it is remains an open question today.
If you're looking forward to autumn nights for the stars, here's where to go: Where to see the stars in the Canary Islands, and we've also gathered the observatory listings.
Sources: BOE: Royal Decree 236/2002 and Order PCM/186/2022 (the 2022 to 2026 calendar); Directive 2000/84/EC and the European Commission's 2027 to 2031 calendar (in the BOE's edition of the EU Official Journal); Real Instituto y Observatorio de la Armada (ROA); Instituto Geográfico Nacional (IGN): La hora oficial en España; Hungarian Government Decree 39/1996. (III. 13.) (Nemzeti Jogszabálytár); European Parliament (2019, 2025, Legislative Train); European Commission; La Moncloa (20 October 2025); Ley 39/2015; Aena; Apple and Google support pages; Canarias7; Diario de Avisos.
Cover photo (cropped): the flower clock in Parque García Sanabria, Santa Cruz de Tenerife. Koppchen, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
