Quick Answer: The American Academy of Sleep Medicine states that permanent standard time is the optimal choice for health and safety. After the spring-forward transition, heart attack risk increases by 24% on the following Monday (Sandhu et al., Open Heart, 2014), fatal car crashes increase by 6% (Fritz et al., Current Biology, 2020), and the average person loses 40 minutes of sleep on the first night. The fall-back transition is less harmful but still disrupts sleep patterns for 3 to 7 days. You cannot control when the clocks change.
Brad Grose, founder, Mattress Miracle, family owned in Brantford since 1997, with 40+ years in the mattress industry: "We have been helping Brantford families sleep better since 1997. Every customer gets personal attention, honest advice, and the kind of follow-up service you just do not get from big box stores."
At 2:00 AM on the first Sunday of November, clocks across most of Ontario move back one hour. You "gain" an hour of sleep. That is the theory. In practice, your body does not read clocks. Your body reads light.
Your suprachiasmatic nucleus, a cluster of approximately 20,000 neurons in your hypothalamus, runs your circadian rhythm. It does not know that Parliament decided decades ago to shift the social clock twice a year. It knows sunrise. It knows sunset. It knows melatonin timing. And when the clocks move, it takes 5 to 7 days for your biology to catch up to your alarm.
Ontario actually passed a law to stop this. Bill 214, the Time Amendment Act, passed unanimously in the Ontario Legislature on November 25, 2020 and received Royal Assent five days later. It would make daylight saving time permanent in Ontario. But it has a condition: it only takes effect when Quebec and New York State adopt the same change. As of today, neither has. So we keep changing clocks. And we keep paying for it with our sleep.
Reading Time: 9 minutes. Updated October 30, 2026.
What One Hour Actually Does to Your Body
One hour seems trivial. You stay up an hour late on a Friday night without thinking about it. You get up an hour early for a flight without drama. The difference with daylight saving time is that the hour shift is not voluntary, it is not temporary, and it does not come with a compensating schedule adjustment. Your alarm still goes off at the same clock time. Your work still starts at the same clock time. Your body is the only thing that knows something changed.
Kantermann, Juda, Merrow, and Roenneberg published a foundational study in Current Biology (2007) analysing data from over 55,000 subjects. Their conclusion was stark: the human circadian clock does not adjust to the DST transition. Under standard time, sleep times naturally track dawn. Under daylight saving time, this alignment breaks, and for late chronotypes (people who are naturally night owls, roughly 25 to 30% of the population), the misalignment persists for the entire duration of DST.
The suprachiasmatic nucleus can shift approximately 1 to 1.5 hours per day in response to appropriately timed bright light. A single 1-hour shift should resolve in 1 to 2 days. In theory. In practice, behavioural adaptation takes 5 to 7 days because indoor artificial lighting is far weaker than natural light, social schedules override biological signals, and the peripheral clocks in your liver, heart, gut, and muscles re-entrain at different rates than the master clock in your brain.
Why Spring Forward Is Worse Than Fall Back
The human circadian clock has a natural period of approximately 24.2 hours. It wants to drift slightly later each day. This is called the "free-running period."
- Fall back (November): You delay by 1 hour. This aligns with the clock's natural drift direction. Your body cooperates. Adjustment is faster, typically 2 to 4 days.
- Spring forward (March): You advance by 1 hour. This works against the clock's natural drift. Your body resists. Adjustment takes 5 to 7 days, sometimes longer for late chronotypes.
This is the same reason that flying west (gaining time) causes less jet lag than flying east (losing time). The direction of the shift matters as much as the magnitude.
This article is general information, not medical advice. If sleep problems, low mood or daytime sleepiness last more than a couple of weeks after a time change, talk to your doctor.
8 min read
When Do Clocks Go Back in 2026? Sunday, November 1, but Not Everywhere
In most of Ontario, clocks go back one hour at 2:00 a.m. on Sunday, November 1, 2026, so 2:00 a.m. becomes 1:00 a.m. and Brantford returns to Eastern Standard Time. Most of Quebec, the Atlantic provinces and Nunavut fall back the same night. This fall, for the first time, Manitoba, Alberta, the Northwest Territories and most of British Columbia do not turn their clocks back at all: each has ended seasonal clock changes and stays on its summer time year-round.
| Where you are | What happens on November 1, 2026 | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Most of Ontario, including Brantford | Clocks go back 1 hour at 2:00 a.m., to Eastern Standard Time | National Research Council Canada |
| Northwestern Ontario west of the 90th meridian (Kenora, Dryden, Sioux Lookout) | Announced by Ontario in October 2026: no change, staying on Central daylight time | Global News, October 15, 2026 |
| Most of Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island and most of Newfoundland and Labrador | Clocks go back 1 hour at 2:00 a.m. local time | National Research Council Canada |
| Manitoba | No change: new year-round Manitoba Standard Time (UTC-5) | Government of Manitoba |
| Saskatchewan (most of the province) | No change: Central Standard Time all year, as before | National Research Council Canada |
| Alberta | No change: new year-round Alberta Time (UTC-6) | Government of Alberta |
| British Columbia (most of the province) | No change: new year-round Pacific time (UTC-7); eastern communities that observe mountain time are not affected | Government of British Columbia |
| Northwest Territories | No change: new year-round Northwest Territories Time (UTC-6) | Government of the Northwest Territories |
| Yukon | No change: UTC-7 year-round since 2020 | National Research Council Canada |
| Nunavut (most communities) | Clocks go back 1 hour at 2:00 a.m. local time | National Research Council Canada |
One side effect if you have family out west: this winter, Winnipeg and Brantford show the same clock time, because Manitoba Standard Time (UTC-5) matches Eastern Standard Time. Calgary and Edmonton will be one hour behind Brantford, and Vancouver two.
Sleep tips for this weekend's fall back
The 15-minute plan further down this page works best when you start it 5 to 7 days ahead. If the change is already this weekend, a shorter version can still help. These are general suggestions, and people adjust at different speeds.
- On Saturday night, go to bed 15 to 30 minutes later than usual, so Sunday morning does not start a full hour early by your body clock.
- Set the clocks back before you go to sleep, then keep your usual wake-up time by the new clock on Sunday and Monday.
- Get daylight or bright light in the late afternoon and early evening for the first few days. The light research below suggests evening light nudges the body clock later, which is the direction fall back needs.
- For babies and toddlers, move naps, meals and bedtime about 15 minutes later each day until they line up with the new clock.
- Keep the bedroom dark early in the morning, with blackout curtains if you have them, since sunrise arrives an hour earlier by the clock and can wake light sleepers.
If you are still waking too early or sleeping badly two weeks after the change, or you live with ongoing insomnia, talk to your doctor. The time change itself usually settles within a week, so trouble that lasts longer may have another cause.
What the October 2026 CMAJ analysis says about permanent daylight time
Three provinces and a territory are moving to permanent daylight time just as a group of Canadian researchers has argued for the other option. A UBC-led analysis in the Canadian Medical Association Journal, published in October 2026 by Raymond W. Lam, Ralph Mistlberger, Patrick Baylis and Alexandra Choi of the University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University and Vancouver Coastal Health, reviewed the health evidence on both permanent choices. The authors concluded that the preponderance of health evidence favours permanent standard time. Their reasoning centres on morning light, which helps set the body clock; permanent daylight time pushes winter sunrises later by the clock. They estimate that 1% to 3% of people in Canada experience seasonal affective disorder, and they flag children and adolescents as possibly more vulnerable, because puberty shifts sleep timing later while school still starts early. They also list ways to soften permanent daylight time where it is chosen, such as safer roads and later or more flexible school and work start times. They also acknowledge the other side: later evening light can make exercise, errands and time with friends easier after work and school.
If your mood, energy or sleep drops every winter, that is worth raising with your doctor. Source: Lam RW, Mistlberger R, Baylis P, Choi A. Analysis of health impacts associated with adopting permanent standard time or permanent daylight saving time to inform policy in Canada. CMAJ. 2026;198(34):E1335-E1340. doi:10.1503/cmaj.261089
Spring Forward: The Transition That Hurts
The spring-forward transition has been the subject of intense medical research, and the findings are consistent enough that the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) now formally opposes it.
Heart Attacks
Sandhu, Seth, and Gurm analysed approximately 42,000 hospital admissions in Michigan over four consecutive years and published their findings in Open Heart (2014). The Monday following the spring-forward transition showed a 24% increase in heart attacks compared to other Mondays during the year. When comparing the Monday after the transition to the Monday before, the increase was 34% (93 heart attacks the week before versus 125 the week after).
A 2024 meta-analysis published in Deutsches Arzteblatt International pooled data from multiple studies and found a pooled relative risk of 1.04 for acute myocardial infarction after the spring transition, a statistically significant 4% increase.
However, a 2025 Duke University study of nearly 170,000 patients (JAMA Network Open) found no significant increase in heart attacks in the weeks around the clock changes. The data on heart attacks and DST is not unanimous, but it is weighted toward risk, and the medical consensus has shifted accordingly.
Car Crashes
Fritz, VoPham, Wright, and Vetter published the definitive study in Current Biology (2020), analysing 732,835 fatal motor vehicle accidents across the United States from 1996 to 2017. Twenty-one years of data. They found a 6% increase in fatal car crashes during the workweek following the spring-forward transition. The increase was concentrated in the morning hours, consistent with sleep deprivation and circadian misalignment. In locations on the western edge of a time zone, where sunrise is already later, the spike exceeded 8%.
Stroke
Sipila and colleagues (2016, Sleep Medicine) analysed a decade of Finnish hospital data and found an 8% increase in ischemic stroke hospitalizations during the first 2 days after the DST transition. For those over age 65, the risk was 20% higher.
Workplace Productivity
Wagner, Barnes, Lim, and Ferris published a study in the Journal of Applied Psychology (2012) using both laboratory experiments and real-world data. They found a dramatic increase in entertainment-related web searches on the Monday after spring forward. In the lab component, for every hour of interrupted sleep the previous night, participants spent 20% of their assigned task time on non-work internet browsing. Chmura Economics estimated the total U.S. economic cost at approximately $672 million annually, factoring in heart attacks, strokes, workplace injuries, and traffic accidents.
Fall Back: The "Extra Hour" You Do Not Actually Get
The keyword most Canadians search is "clocks go back," and the common assumption is that this transition is the easy one. You gain an hour. Free sleep. No downsides.
It is not that simple.
The Sandhu Michigan study found a 21% decrease in heart attacks on the Tuesday following the fall-back transition, suggesting a mild protective redistribution effect from the gained hour. The 2024 meta-analysis found the autumn transition effect was not statistically significant. So yes, fall back is safer than spring forward. That part is true.
But the sleep disruption is real. Harvard Health reports that the average person's sleep is affected for 5 to 7 days after either transition. A study in Sleep Science and Practice (2022) measured a lingering 18.7% decrease in the daily likelihood of participants reporting they felt rested, even after the fall-back transition.
Here is what happens in practice: you have been waking up at 6:30 AM for months. Your body is calibrated to that time. On November 1, the clock says 6:30 but your body says 7:30. You wake at 5:30 AM clock time, an hour before your alarm, and lie in the dark. You cannot fall back asleep because your circadian rhythm says morning. By evening, you are exhausted an hour earlier than usual, but you force yourself to stay up because it is "only 9 PM." You go to bed at your usual clock time but fall asleep faster due to accumulated fatigue. You wake at 5:15 AM. The cycle takes 3 to 5 days to resolve.
For parents of young children, the disruption is worse. Children's circadian clocks are less flexible than adults'. A toddler who wakes at 6:00 AM will wake at 5:00 AM after the fall-back transition and will not understand why the rest of the house disagrees.
The 15-Minute Adjustment Strategy
The AASM recommends beginning adjustment 5 to 7 days before the transition. Shift your bedtime and wake time by 15 minutes every 2 days in the direction of the upcoming change. For the fall-back transition: go to bed 15 minutes later and set your alarm 15 minutes later, then repeat. By the time the clocks change, your body has already made three 15-minute adjustments and the transition is less abrupt. For the spring-forward transition, shift 15 minutes earlier. This works for children too, and for children, it matters more because their adjustment window is longer.
Where Canada Stands on Ending Clock Changes
The public sentiment is overwhelmingly in favour of ending the twice-yearly clock change. The political execution has been less decisive.
Ontario
Bill 214 passed unanimously in 2020. It would establish permanent daylight saving time. It has not taken effect because it requires Quebec and New York to adopt the same policy. Neither has done so. The bill remains law but unproclaimed.
British Columbia
After a public consultation where 93% of 223,000 respondents supported permanent daylight time, BC passed the Interpretation Amendment Act in 2019. It requires Washington, Oregon, and California to act first. None have. The act remains dormant.
Update, October 30, 2026: B.C. stopped waiting. The province announced on March 2, 2026 that the March 8 spring-forward would be its last time change, and from November 1, 2026 most of B.C. stays on Pacific time (UTC-7) year-round (Government of British Columbia).
Alberta
A binding referendum in October 2021 asked Albertans whether they wanted year-round daylight saving time. It was defeated by the narrowest of margins: 50.2% No, 49.8% Yes. Alberta continues to change clocks.
Update, October 30, 2026: Alberta has since adopted permanent Alberta Time (UTC-6), and clocks there do not go back on November 1, 2026 (Government of Alberta).
Quebec
Justice Minister Simon Jolin-Barrette launched a public consultation in fall 2024. More than 214,000 responses were received. Ninety-one percent said they want to stop changing clocks. Nearly three-quarters preferred permanent standard time over permanent daylight time. No legislation has been tabled as of early 2026.
Federal
Liberal MP Marie-France Lalonde announced in October 2025 that she would table a private member's bill to end DST nationally. The bill calls for a pan-Canadian conference with provincial, territorial, and Indigenous stakeholders. Under the Canadian Constitution, timekeeping is a provincial and territorial matter, so federal legislation can only coordinate, not mandate.
Saskatchewan does not observe DST. It stays on Central Standard Time year-round. Yukon adopted permanent Yukon Standard Time (UTC-7) in 2020. The rest of the country continues to change clocks, waiting for neighbours to move first.
Update, October 30, 2026: Manitoba, Alberta, the Northwest Territories, most of British Columbia and northwestern Ontario west of the 90th meridian join them in not changing clocks from November 1, 2026, so most of Ontario, Quebec, Atlantic Canada and Nunavut are now the main regions still falling back.
The AASM's Position
The American Academy of Sleep Medicine updated its position statement in 2024 (Rishi et al., Journal of Clinical Sleep Medicine, 20(1):121-125): "Permanent standard time is the optimal choice for health and safety." This is important because it disagrees with what most Canadian provinces have proposed. Ontario, BC, and the failed Alberta referendum all targeted permanent daylight saving time (later sunsets). The sleep science community says the opposite: permanent standard time (earlier sunrises) aligns better with human circadian biology. The debate is not just about stopping the change. It is about which time to keep.
How to Sleep Through the Transition
Until the politicians coordinate, which could take years, you will change your clocks twice annually. The question is how to minimize the damage.
Light exposure is the most powerful tool. Morning bright light advances your circadian clock (helpful before spring forward). Evening light exposure delays it (helpful before fall back). Kantermann's 2024 study in Scientific Reports found that evening light changes are the primary driver of circadian re-entrainment during DST transitions.
But light exposure works on a scale of days. What happens on the nights of the transition itself, when your sleep is most fragmented, depends on the environment you are sleeping in. Temperature, noise, comfort, and motion transfer all become more relevant when your circadian alignment is off.
Why Mattress Quality Matters More During Transitions
When your circadian rhythm is aligned, your body has a robust drive to sleep. Minor discomforts, a slightly warm mattress, a partner shifting position, are overridden by the strength of the sleep signal. When your circadian rhythm is disrupted, that sleep drive weakens. The same minor discomforts now become barriers to falling asleep and staying asleep. You are more sensitive to temperature, to motion transfer, to surface comfort.
This is why the same mattress that feels "fine" for 51 weeks of the year might feel inadequate during the two transition weeks. It is not the mattress that changed. It is your resilience to its imperfections.
For the Transition-Sensitive Sleeper
The Restonic ComfortCare at $1,619 for a queen has 1,222 individually wrapped pocket coils with TempaGel cooling in the comfort top. Pocket coils eliminate the motion transfer that becomes a problem during light, fragmented transition-week sleep. When you are in and out of shallow sleep stages, every partner movement registers. Pocket coils isolate that movement to its point of origin.
For the Temperature-Sensitive Sleeper
The Revive Reflections at $2,587 for a queen has Joma Wool, a natural thermoregulator that wicks moisture and dissipates heat. During circadian disruption, your body's temperature regulation becomes less precise. A comfort layer that passively manages temperature fills the gap that your circadian system is temporarily unable to cover. The flippable design (firm and plush sides) also means you can adjust during periods when your comfort preferences shift, which they do during circadian misalignment.
For the Couple Where One Partner Adjusts Faster
In most couples, one person adapts to the time change within 2 days and the other takes a full week. The early adapter returns to normal sleep depth and movement patterns while the slow adapter is still in light, fragmented sleep. A mattress with strong motion isolation, like the Restonic pocket coil range, prevents the adapted partner from disrupting the still-adjusting partner. This is a specific, measurable benefit during the transition weeks.
Frequently Asked Questions
When do clocks go back in Canada?
Clocks go back 1 hour on the first Sunday in November at 2:00 AM in most Canadian provinces. In 2026, that is November 1. Saskatchewan does not observe daylight saving time, and Yukon adopted permanent standard time in 2020. Most of Ontario, Quebec, the Atlantic provinces and Nunavut continue to change clocks twice per year. Update for 2026: Manitoba, Alberta, the Northwest Territories, most of British Columbia and northwestern Ontario west of the 90th meridian have ended seasonal clock changes and do not turn their clocks back on November 1, 2026.
How long does it take to adjust to the time change?
Most adults take 3 to 7 days to fully adjust. The fall-back transition (gaining an hour) is generally easier, taking 2 to 4 days. The spring-forward transition (losing an hour) takes 5 to 7 days because it works against the natural drift of the circadian clock. Children and late chronotypes (night owls) may take longer. The AASM recommends starting adjustment 5 to 7 days before the transition by shifting bedtime 15 minutes every 2 days.
Does the spring-forward time change really cause heart attacks?
Multiple studies have found an association. Sandhu et al. (Open Heart, 2014) found a 24% increase in heart attacks on the Monday after spring forward. A 2024 meta-analysis found a statistically significant 4% pooled increase. However, a 2025 Duke University study of 170,000 patients found no significant increase. The medical consensus leans toward risk, and the AASM now formally opposes the spring-forward transition.
Will Canada stop changing clocks?
Ontario and BC both passed laws to end clock changes that were conditional on neighbouring jurisdictions (Quebec, New York, Washington, Oregon, California) adopting the same policy. Quebec's 2024 public consultation showed 91% support for ending changes. A federal private member's bill was announced in 2025. Progress is slow because timekeeping is a provincial matter under the Canadian Constitution, requiring coordination rather than mandate. Update for 2026: B.C. has since gone ahead on its own, and B.C., Alberta, Manitoba and the Northwest Territories have ended clock changes, effective November 1, 2026. Ontario's law is still waiting on Quebec and New York, though Ontario has announced that northwestern Ontario west of the 90th meridian will stay on Central daylight time.
How does the time change affect sleep quality?
The average person loses 40 minutes of sleep on the first night after spring forward. A study in Sleep Science and Practice found an 18.7% decrease in feeling rested that persists for several days after either transition. The disruption occurs because the social clock shifts but environmental light cues do not change, creating temporary circadian misalignment. Improving your sleep surface reduces the impact of this misalignment by minimizing secondary sleep disruptors like temperature and motion transfer.
The Clocks Will Change. Your Sleep Does Not Have to Suffer.
Come test the Restonic pocket coil range at Mattress Miracle, 441 1/2 West Street, Brantford. Brad, Dorothy, and Talia can walk you through the TempaGel cooling, the Joma Wool thermoregulation, and the motion isolation that makes the transition weeks feel like any other week.
Call (519) 770-0001 or visit during store hours: Mon-Wed 10-6, Thu-Fri 10-7, Sat 10-5, Sun 12-4.
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Sources
- Walker M. Why We Sleep: Unlocking the Power of Sleep and Dreams. Scribner. 2017. ISBN: 978-1501144318.
- Okamoto-Mizuno K, Mizuno K. Effects of thermal environment on sleep and circadian rhythm. J Physiol Anthropol. 2012;31(1):14. DOI: 10.1186/1880-6805-31-14
- Krauchi K. The thermophysiological cascade leading to sleep initiation in relation to phase of entrainment. Sleep Med Rev. 2007;11(6):439-451. DOI: 10.1016/j.smrv.2007.07.001
- Haskell EH, Palca JW, Walker JM, Berger RJ, Heller HC. The effects of high and low ambient temperatures on human sleep stages. Electroencephalogr Clin Neurophysiol. 1981;51(5):494-501.
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