Source: https://forexiapro.com/gold-trading/xauusd-trading-hours/

# XAUUSD Trading Hours: Where Gold Really Moves, by Session

Forexia Academy11 November 20266 min read

XAUUSD trading hours, on the feed our charts use, run from 18:00 New York time on Sunday to 17:00 on Friday, with a one-hour gap from 17:00 to 18:00 each weekday. Across 223 trading days of real candles, the busiest hours were 08:00 to 12:00 and 20:00 to 22:00 New York time, and the quietest was the last hour before the 17:00 break. Below are the sessions, the hour-by-hour figures and what they can and cannot tell you.

[![XAUUSD trading hours: the average range of a gold candle in each New York hour](/seo/xauusd-trading-hours/xauusd-trading-hours-average-range-by-hour.webp)](/seo/xauusd-trading-hours/xauusd-trading-hours-average-range-by-hour.webp)

Average high-to-low range of a 15-minute XAUUSD candle by New York hour, 223 trading days from 29 December 2025 to 6 November 2026. The tallest bars are 16.8 pips at 09:00 and 16.7 at 10:00. Dukascopy bid, $1 = 1 pip.

This page was written on 11 November 2026. On gold we count $1 as 1 pip, all times are New York unless we say London, and chart prices are Dukascopy's bid. Brokers set their own hours, so treat the times as those of our feed and check your broker's. For how a pip is sized on gold, see XAUUSD pip value, and for the guide as a whole, [how to trade gold](/gold-trading/).

## What are the XAUUSD trading hours?

On our candles the week opens at 18:00 on Sunday and the last candle of the week opens at 16:45 on Friday. Each weekday the last candle opens at 16:45 and the next at 18:00, so there is no trading in the hour from 17:00. That break is where our charts end one trading day and start the next, and it is why a day's open and close here are quoted from 18:00 to 16:45.

We did not read exchange schedules from the exchange's own pages for this post, so we give no futures hours. The one published schedule we did verify is the benchmark's. ICE Benchmark Administration, which [administers the LBMA Gold Price](https://www.ice.com/iba/lbma-gold-price), says its auctions "are run at 10:30 and 15:00 London time for gold". The price comes from each auction's final round, so there is no fixed publication minute. Those start times are 05:30 and 10:00 New York when both cities are on the same side of their clock changes. They differ by a few weeks in spring and autumn.

## Which session does gold move in most?

We use the same three windows as our chart markups. The Asian window runs from the 17:00 break to 03:00, which is the 08:00 London open. London runs from 03:00 to 08:00, and New York from 08:00 to the 17:00 break. Here is each window's high-to-low range on the 223 days, in pips.

| Session (New York time) | Hours open | Median range | Middle half of days |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Asian, 17:00 break to 03:00 | 9 | 58 | 44 to 79 |
| London, 03:00 to 08:00 | 5 | 33 | 25 to 46 |
| New York, 08:00 to 17:00 | 9 | 64 | 46 to 90 |
| The whole day | 23 | 99 | 75 to 135 |

New York has the largest median, 64 pips, and Asia is close behind at 58. London looks quiet at 33, but it is five hours long against nine, so the table is not a per-hour comparison. The hour chart above is. Each window's range also overlaps the others, so the three do not add up to the day.

The "middle half" column is the range between the 25th and 75th percentile of days: half of all days fell inside it. It shows how much one session varies from day to day. New York's runs from 46 to 90 pips, so a typical day and a big day differ by almost double.

## Where do the day's high and low come from?

Counting which window held each day's highest and lowest price gives a different picture from the ranges.

| Session | Days with the day's high | Days with the day's low |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Asian | 102 | 103 |
| London | 18 | 18 |
| New York | 103 | 102 |

Of 223 days, the day's high and low each came in the Asian or the New York window on 205. Only 18 days put the high in London's five hours, and 18 the low. London covers about a fifth of the hours gold trades, so its share is small. Some of that is edge effect, since a day that begins at its low or ends at its high counts for the window at that edge. It does not say London is unimportant, because London is often where the Asian range is broken, which this count does not see. It says that, on these days, the extreme was rarely printed there.

## Which hours are the busiest?

Back to the chart at the top. Each bar is the average high-to-low range of a 15-minute candle that opened in that New York hour.

- **08:00 to 12:00.** 14.6, 16.8, 16.7 and 13.2 pips. This is the New York open. Many US releases are timed at 08:30 and 10:00, so the hour is busy for more than one reason, and the chart cannot separate them.
- **20:00 to 22:00.** 13.4 and 14.1 pips. That is the Asian morning, around the time Tokyo opens. It is the second peak and is easy to miss on a New York clock.
- **03:00 to 07:00.** Between 8.7 and 10.1 pips. The London open at 03:00 does not stand out: it averages 10.1 pips, the same as 02:00.
- **16:00.** 7.0 pips, the quietest hour with candles, just ahead of the 17:00 break. The 23:00 hour is next at 7.9.

The figures are averages of a very large number of candles, about 890 for each hour, but averages hide the odd large day. They also describe what gold did in these 223 days, and say nothing about what it does next.

## What happens at the 17:00 New York break?

Nothing prints. The last candle of the day opens at 16:45 and the next at 18:00. A price can differ across that gap, and a stop placed near the break can fill at a different price from the one you see. We have not measured the size of those gaps, so we give no figure.

The break is also why our day charts run from 17:00 and why we call the Asian window the [Asian box](/glossary/the-asian-box/): it is the range printed between the break and the London open, and the day's later pushes are measured against it.

## What can you do with this?

Use it to plan your attention, not to predict direction.

1. **Know which hours your broker offers.** Compare your platform's gold hours with the 18:00 to 17:00 pattern above. A different clock changes which candle is the first of the day.
2. **Set your stop for the hour, not for the average.** A 15-minute candle at 09:00 averages 16.8 pips of range, nearly double the 8.7 at 06:00. A stop sized for the quiet hour can be touched by one ordinary candle in the busy one.
3. **Check the calendar before the busy hours.** Many US releases are timed at 08:30 and 10:00. Gold on a Fed day and how NFP moves gold show two of them.
4. **Do not read the table as a rule.** More range means more room for profit and for loss, and we found no hour that is safe. Our own fixed rule of trading against stop hunts lost money after costs, as the [stop hunt guide](/stop-hunt/) sets out.

For the other markets' sessions, see the [forex sessions guide](/forex-sessions/).

## What can this page not tell you?

It uses one instrument, one feed and 223 days of a year in which gold made a record in January and then fell. A calmer year would show smaller numbers, and a different broker's clock would shift the windows. The hour table averages candle ranges, which are not the same as moves that a trade could capture. Exchange schedules and holiday closures are not covered, and neither is the weekend gap.

[Course 1 of ForexiaPRO](/pro), Reading the Map, teaches how a session's range is read, starting in lesson 1.1.2.

## Tools for this

- [Pip calculator](/tools/pip-calculator/)
- [Lot size calculator](/tools/forex-lot-size-calculator/)
- [Risk-reward calculator](/tools/risk-reward-calculator/)

## Frequently asked questions

### What are the XAUUSD trading hours?

On our Dukascopy feed, gold trades from 18:00 New York time on Sunday to 17:00 on Friday, with a one-hour gap from 17:00 to 18:00 each weekday. Brokers set their own hours, and holidays shorten them, so check your broker's contract page before you rely on a time.

### What is the best time to trade gold?

This page cannot say when to trade, only when gold has moved most. In 223 days of our candles the largest average candles came between 08:00 and 12:00 New York and between 20:00 and 22:00. Moving most is not the same as being easiest to trade, and a wide candle cuts both ways.

### Is gold more active in the London or the New York session?

On our candles New York. The median New York session, 08:00 to 17:00, was 64 pips from high to low, against 33 for London's 03:00 to 08:00. London is also shorter, five hours against nine, so the comparison is not per hour.

### Does gold trade 24 hours a day?

Nearly. On our feed it trades for 23 hours on each weekday and is closed from Friday 17:00 to Sunday 18:00 New York time. Some exchange contracts have other schedules, and we did not verify them for this page.

### When is the LBMA gold price set?

ICE Benchmark Administration says its auctions run at 10:30 and 15:00 London time. The price is then set by the final round of each auction, so there is no fixed publication minute.

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