F&O until 3:45 pm: NSE’s new market timings from 7 December 2026

Part 5 of 5 in Costs, tax and the basics

Updated 31 October 2026 · यह गाइड हिन्दी में पढ़ें →

SEBI’s circular of 15 October 2026 changes how the trading day ends on NSE, from Monday, 7 December 2026. Shares still trade from 9:15 am to 3:30 pm, but the close moves: futures and options trade until 3:45 pm instead of 3:40 pm, and the closing auction for shares moves to 3:30 to 3:40 pm. The circular is addressed to every recognised stock exchange and clearing corporation, so BSE moves too. The old hours run until Friday, 4 December 2026.

The close, before and after

So shares that have F&O contracts get 15 more minutes of normal trading, the auction starts and ends later, and F&O gets 5 more minutes. The market page always shows the hours in force that day.

How the closing auction works

For a share in the auction, the closing price is not the last trade before 3:30 pm. It comes out of a short auction, which NSE for now runs only for shares that have F&O contracts (it calls this phase 1). From 7 December 2026 it runs like this:

1. 3:30 to 3:31 pm. Normal trading stops and the exchange works out a reference price: the volume-weighted average price (VWAP) of the share’s trades in the last 15 minutes of normal trading. If there were none, it uses the day’s last traded price.
2. 3:31 to 3:36 pm. You can place limit orders and market orders.
3. From 3:36 pm. You can place only limit orders, and market orders already placed can no longer be changed or cancelled. Order entry then stops at a random moment between 3:38 and 3:40 pm, picked by the system, so nobody can wait for the last second.
4. Matching. The exchange finds one price for all the orders and publishes it, with the quantity traded, as the closing price.

Stop-loss orders and new iceberg orders are not allowed in the auction, and an order you place in it needs its margin when you place it.

Worked example: one price for everyone

Say these are the only orders in Stock ABC (made-up numbers) when order entry stops:

At each price, add up the shares buyers would take (every buy order at that price or higher) and the shares sellers would give (every sell order at that price or lower). The smaller of the two is what can trade:

₹500 lets the most shares change hands, so 550 shares trade there and Stock ABC closes at ₹500. Everyone who trades gets that one price, including the buyer who was ready to pay ₹502. The better-priced orders fill first: the buys at ₹502 and ₹501 fill in full and only 50 of the 400 shares bid at ₹500 do, while the sells at ₹499 and ₹500 fill and the 400 offered at ₹501 don’t. A market order would have counted at every price. If two prices tied, NSE would take the one leaving fewer shares unmatched, then the one closer to the reference price.

Expiry day

Two things change on the day contracts expire.

• Expiring index contracts stop at 3:30 pm. Other index contracts trade until 3:45 pm. Stock futures and options trade until 3:45 pm on every day, expiry days included.
• The settlement price comes from the last 30 minutes of normal trading. For an expiring index contract, it is the index worked out from the VWAP of each share in it over those 30 minutes. For an expiring stock contract, it is the stock’s VWAP over the same 30 minutes, across all exchanges. Under the January 2026 rules it came from the closing auction prices. The exchanges show an indicative value live through the half hour.

With normal trading ending at 3:30 pm, that half hour runs from 3:00 to 3:30 pm. A trade inside it counts towards the average by its size, so one small trade at 3:29 pm hardly moves the settlement price.

One more change on 8 February 2027

From 8 February 2027, a limit order that has not traded by the end of normal trading carries into the auction by itself, unless it is a stop-loss order or its price is outside the auction’s price band. An unfilled iceberg order carries over as a plain limit order showing its full quantity, unless you opted out when you placed it. Orders carried over come ahead of orders placed during the auction. You can still change one, but it then loses its place in the queue.

What it means for your trades

• If you trade shares that have F&O contracts, normal trading runs until 3:30 pm, 15 minutes later than before.
• If you trade F&O, you can trade until 3:45 pm, except an expiring index contract on its expiry day, which stops at 3:30 pm.
• SEBI’s circular says nothing about intraday square-off. Each broker sets its own time for closing open intraday positions, so check your broker’s square-off times for the new hours. Intraday vs delivery explains how square-off works.
• The post-close session stays at 3:50 to 4:00 pm, where you can buy or sell shares at the day’s closing price.
• On a special trading session, the auction still lasts 10 minutes, F&O closes 5 minutes after it and the 10-minute post-close session starts 5 minutes after that. Muhurat trading on Sunday, 8 November 2026 comes before the change, so it follows NSE’s earlier timings.

The risk side

Longer hours don’t change the odds. SEBI’s studies (SEBI study, 2023 and 2025) found that about 9 in 10 individual F&O traders lost money in FY22 and FY25, and five more minutes of trading is five more minutes in which a position can move against you. If you trade, set your stop-loss and position size before you enter, and count the charges.

Questions people ask

From when do the new NSE market timings apply?

From Monday, 7 December 2026. The old hours run until Friday, 4 December 2026. One part, carrying unfilled limit orders into the closing auction, applies from 8 February 2027.

Until what time can I trade F&O from 7 December?

Until 3:45 pm on every trading day. The one exception is an expiring index contract on its expiry day, which stops at 3:30 pm. Stock futures and options trade until 3:45 pm on expiry days too.

Do the hours for shares change?

Normal trading still runs from 9:15 am to 3:30 pm. Shares that have F&O contracts now trade normally until 3:30 pm instead of 3:15 pm, then go into a closing auction from 3:30 to 3:40 pm. The post-close session stays at 3:50 to 4:00 pm.

Does this apply to BSE too?

Yes. SEBI addressed the circular to all recognised stock exchanges and clearing corporations, so the same hours apply on BSE. Each exchange publishes its own notices with the details.

Why did SEBI change the timings?

SEBI says it reviewed the closing auction, the market timings and the way expiry-day settlement prices are worked out "with a view to ensuring efficient price discovery and orderly functioning of the cash and derivatives segments", after a consultation paper in September 2026 and advice from its Secondary Market Advisory Committee.

Sources

• SEBI circular of 15 October 2026: closing auction, market timings and settlement of derivatives contracts
• SEBI circular of 16 January 2026: the closing auction session in the equity cash segment
• NSE: closing auction session

Related

• Intraday vs delivery trading
• What is a lot size?
• How to read an option chain
• Trading charges explained