Is daylight saving time ending in 2023? What to know about proposed Sunshine Protection Act

Twice a year, most Americans change their clocks forward or back an hour as part of daylight saving time.

And it seems that each time this twice-annual change occurs, the discussion of making daylight saving time permanent comes once again to the forefront.

The idea to end the clocks changing was put before Congress in the last couple of years, when the U.S. Senate unanimously approved the Sunshine Protection Act in 2022, a bill that would make daylight saving time permanent.

Here's what to know about the status of national lawmakers and their consideration to make daylight saving time permanent.

Is daylight saving time ending? What to know about Sunshine Protection Act

Although the Sunshine Protection Act was passed unanimously by the Senate in 2022, it did not pass in the U.S. House of Representatives and was not signed into law by President Joe Biden.

A 2023 version of the act has remained idle in Congress as well.

How did daylight saving time start?

A version of the modern daylight saving time we observe today was first proposed by Benjamin Franklin in 1784 in a satirical essay to the editor of The Journal of Paris, suggesting that Parisians could save money on candles and lamp oil by changing their sleep schedules. However, nothing came of Franklin's proposal.

Daylight saving time was first implemented in the U.S. in 1918 during World War I with the Standard Time Act, which added more daylight hours to conserve energy. Under the Standard Time Act, clocks would move forward an hour on the last Sunday of March and move back an hour on the last Sunday of October. It also established five time zones across the U.S.

The Uniform Time Act of 1966 established daylight saving time more systematically throughout the U.S., though even today it is not observed in every state or territory.

In 1974, a law signed by President Richard Nixon created year-round daylight saving time in order to save fuel during a national gas crisis. However, the early morning darkness caused some accidents for children going to school, and the Watergate scandal moved Nixon out of office a few months later.

An amendment was introduced seven days after Nixon's resignation in September 1974 to end Nixon's daylight saving time experiment, which was signed by President Gerald Ford the following month.

When does daylight saving time end in 2023?

On Sunday, Nov. 5 at 2 a.m. local time, our clocks will go back an hour and we will gain an hour of sleep, part of the twice-annual time change that affects most, but not all, Americans.

In March, daylight saving time will begin again for 2024, when we set our clocks forward and lose an hour of sleep.

'Fall back,' don't 'spring forward'

We gain an hour in November (as opposed to losing an hour in the spring) to accommodate for more daylight in the mornings. When we "spring forward" in March, it's to add more daylight in the summer evenings. In the Northern Hemisphere, the autumnal equinox was Sept. 23, marking the start of the fall season. 

When does daylight saving time end 2023?Here's when to set your clocks back an hour

Do all states observe daylight saving time?

No, not all states and U.S. territories participate in daylight saving time.

Hawaii and Arizona (with the exception of the Navajo Nation) do not observe daylight saving time, and neither do the territories of American Samoa, Guam, the Northern Mariana Islands, Puerto Rico and the U.S. Virgin Islands.