Lesson 1.6
Gold trading hours: when does XAU/USD open?
Gold trades almost 24 hours a day, Sunday evening to Friday evening. See when XAU/USD opens and closes in UK time, the daily break, the sessions, and when gold moves most.
Gold (XAU/USD) right now
Open Sunday to Friday
Sunday 23:00 to Friday 22:00 UK time, with a daily break from 22:00 to 23:00.
This week, in UK time
- Week opens
- Sunday 23:00
- Daily break
- 22:00 to 23:00, Monday to Thursday
- Week closes
- Friday 22:00
Trading sessions today, in UK time
London and New York both open: usually gold's busiest hours
Short answer: gold (XAU/USD) trades from Sunday 23:00 to Friday 22:00 UK time, almost around the clock. There’s a one-hour daily break from 22:00 to 23:00 UK time, Monday to Thursday. The schedule comes from the US gold futures market, which runs Sunday 6pm to Friday 5pm New York time, and most brokers follow it to within a few minutes.
Gold trading hours in your time zone
| New York (ET) | UK | Central Europe (CET) | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Week opens | Sunday 18:00 | Sunday 23:00 | Monday 00:00 |
| Daily break | 17:00 to 18:00 | 22:00 to 23:00 | 23:00 to 00:00 |
| Week closes | Friday 17:00 | Friday 22:00 | Friday 23:00 |
The UK times stay the same in summer and winter, because the UK and the US both move their clocks. The exception is a few weeks in March and around the end of October, when the two countries change their clocks on different dates and everything happens an hour earlier for UK traders. The clock above always shows the right time for where you are.
Why gold has a daily break
Every weekday at 17:00 New York time, the exchange behind gold’s price pauses for an hour to settle the day’s trades. Your broker’s XAU/USD price stops moving too. You can’t open or close trades during the break, and spreads are often wide just before and after it.
Your broker’s clock may show a different time
MetaTrader 5 shows prices in your broker’s server time, not your local time. Many brokers set their servers two or three hours ahead of UK time, so the week appears to start at 01:00 on Monday. Nothing has changed: it’s the same moment, just labelled differently. Your broker’s exact hours for XAU/USD are in the symbol’s specification in MetaTrader.
The three sessions, and when gold moves most
Gold trades all day, but not evenly. Activity follows the working hours of the big financial centres:
| Session | UK time (roughly) | What it’s like for gold |
|---|---|---|
| Asia (Tokyo, Sydney, Hong Kong) | 00:00 to 09:00 | Usually calmer, smaller ranges |
| London | 08:00 to 16:30 | Busier from the open; the London gold price is set at 10:30 and 15:00 |
| New York | 13:00 to 22:00 | Busy, especially at the start |
| London and New York overlap | 13:00 to 16:30 | Usually the busiest hours of the day |
Big US economic reports, such as jobs and inflation numbers, usually come out at 13:30 UK time. Gold can move several dollars in seconds around them, which is a lot of pips. Spreads widen and stop losses can fill worse than expected.
The quietest stretch is usually the late US afternoon and early Asian evening, roughly 18:00 to 23:00 UK time.
Weekends and gaps
Gold doesn’t trade at the weekend, but news still happens. When the market reopens on Sunday night, the first price can be well above or below Friday’s close. This is called a gap. A stop loss inside the gap doesn’t fill at your price; it fills at the first available price, which can mean a bigger loss than you planned.
That’s why some traders close positions before the Friday close, or trade smaller over the weekend.
Holidays
Around Christmas, New Year, and some US and UK bank holidays, gold often trades shorter hours or with very thin volume. Your broker publishes holiday hours in advance, usually as a notice on their website or in your trading platform.
Key points
- Gold trades Sunday 23:00 to Friday 22:00 UK time, with a daily break from 22:00 to 23:00.
- Most brokers show these times in their own server time, often two or three hours ahead of the UK.
- Gold is usually busiest when London and New York are both open, from about 13:00 to 16:30 UK time.
- Prices can gap over the weekend, and stops inside the gap fill at the next available price.
When to trade gold within those hours depends on your strategy and your day. That’s covered properly inside our partner Traders World, where analysts post their trade ideas for each session.