Will we say goodbye to daylight saving time in 2025? Here is what we know

It’s almost time to turn back our clocks an hour. Daylight saving time ends on Sunday, Nov. 3, 2024. Will this be the last time we turn back our clocks?
As of right now, Daylight saving time is still federally mandated by the U.S. government. Several U.S. states have passed bills aiming to establish year-round Daylight Saving Time, but action is required on the federal level to make any changes possible, per USA Today.
Until the Uniform Time Act is repealed or a new federal bill is passed, expect to change your clocks again in 2025.
Here is a look at the history of daylight saving time and the chances of it becoming permanent.
Contrary to popular misconception, daylight saving time actually has nothing to do with farmers.
Benjamin Franklin is widely credited with conceptualizing the idea during the 18th century, per The New York Times. Franklin believed he was wasting early daylight hours in bed while in Paris, and starting the morning off earlier would economize candle consumption at night.
He suggested that the French fire cannons earlier to take better advantage of daylight hours.
Daylight saving time first went into effect in the United States in March 1916 as a means to save fuel as the country entered World War I, reported TIME. But noticeable benefits of the time change had little to do with energy conservation.
“Golf ball sales skyrocketed during Daylight Saving Time … Baseball is a huge early supporter, too, because there’s no artificial illumination of parks, so to get school kids and workers to ball games with the extended daylight, they have a later start time,” according to Michael Downing, author of, “Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving Time,” per TIME.
Farmers opposed daylight saving time and rallied against it, per The American Farm Bureau Federation. Farmers rise before the sun all year and the time on the clock does not impact when they did to milk cows, collect eggs and harvest crops.
The shift in time made it challenging for farmers to get their harvest to markets on time. Due to opposition from farmers, daylight saving time was taken out of practice.
During World War II, daylight saving time was enacted once again, but New York City and other areas chose not to follow what became known as “war time,” per TIME. Confusion followed.
There were, “cities observing Daylight Saving Time surrounded by rural areas that are not, and no one can tell what time it is anywhere,” Downing said.
The confusion promoted President Lyndon B. Johnson to enact The Uniform Time Act in 1966, which established standard times across the country.
Daylight saving time made a brief comeback during the 1970s, amid the energy crisis, the aim was to conserve fuel, per CNN.
President Richard Nixon signed year-round daylight saving time into law in Jan. 1974, but that summer Congress voted to return to standard time, The New York Times reported in 1974.
In 1986, the U.S. returned to Daylight Saving Time for seven months every year, per TIME. Then in 2005, daylight saving time was extended to eight months a year, and it’s stayed that way since.
Daylight saving time is not observed in Hawaii and Arizona, though the Navajo Nation in northern Arizona does follow daylight saving time, per Live Science. U.S. territories Guam, American Samoa, Puerto Rico, Northern Marina Islands and the U.S. Virgin Islands do not practice Daylight Saving Time.
The Uniform Time Act allows states to stick to standard time year-round, but bars states from practicing daylight saving time year-round. In recent years, 19 states have passed legislation supporting year-round daylight saving time, but none of those bills or laws can take effect until the Uniform Time Act is repealed on the federal level, per KGW, an NBC News affiliate.
Alabama, Colorado, Delaware, Louisiana, Utah and Oregon have all passed bills related to daylight savings changes, but are depended on federal action to implement changes.
In 2018, U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio introduced “The Sunshine Protection Act,” which keeps the entire country on daylight savings time year-round. Some potential benefits of the bill noted by Sen. Rubio include:
A version of that bill was unanimously passed by U.S. Congress in 2022, but was never signed by the U.S. House of Representatives or President Joe Biden. Another version of the bill was introduced in 2023, but never made it past congress, as reported by USA Today.
Unless a federal bill is passed that repeals The Uniform Time Act, Daylight Saving Time will begin again on Sunday, March 9, 2025.