how does daylight savings work

Daylight Saving Time (DST) works by setting clocks forward by one hour in the spring ("spring forward") to make better use of daylight during the warmer months, resulting in longer evenings with more sunlight. Then in the fall, clocks are set back by one hour ("fall back") to standard time, giving an extra hour of daylight in the morning and reverting to the usual schedule. More specifically, in places like the United States, DST starts at 2 a.m. local time on the second Sunday in March, when clocks jump forward from 2:00 to 3:00 a.m., causing that day to have only 23 hours. DST ends at 2 a.m. on the first Sunday in November, when clocks are set back from 2:00 to 1:00 a.m., resulting in a 25-hour day. This shift aims to move an hour of daylight from the morning to the evening during the longer days of spring, summer, and early fall to better align waking hours with daylight and potentially conserve energy by reducing the need for artificial lighting in the evening. While about 40% of countries worldwide observe DST, some regions like Hawaii and most of Arizona in the U.S. do not. The whole practice is often summarized with the mnemonic "spring forward, fall back." However, DST can disrupt sleep patterns and circadian rhythms due to the abrupt clock changes.