Clocks Changing With a Baby

Who actually publishes on this

Almost nobody. The NHS, the Lullaby Trust, Ireland's HSE and Red Nose Australia have nothing specific on the clock change and babies. The American Academy of Pediatrics does, and it is the only body-level advice available, so it is worth reading as what it is: sensible published guidance rather than a tested protocol for under-ones.

Its method is a gradual shift. "For younger children, start nudging naps and bedtime in the direction the clocks will be changing a few minutes each day. Ideally, start this process about a week before the time change." So for the autumn change, when the clocks go back and 7am becomes 6am, you shift naps and bedtime slightly later in the days beforehand.

Which direction is harder

The AAP says the spring change — losing an hour — "may be a little easier on young children, who tend to be early risers", and that the autumn change "can cause younger kids to crash before bedtime and wake up earlier than usual in the morning".

That is the opposite of the adult experience, and it explains why the October change is the one parents complain about. A baby who woke at 6am now wakes at what the clock calls 5am, and a bedtime that felt right at 7pm now arrives when they are already past it.

The other option, which is doing nothing

Worth saying honestly: no health body publishes evidence that pre-shifting works for babies under one, and the alternative approach — change the clocks, carry on as normal, and let the day resettle over roughly a week — is not published as inferior. Babies under about four months have no established body clock to shift in the first place. Ireland's HSE describes newborns as not knowing the difference between day and night, with sleep affected more by hunger than by the hour.

If your baby is young, or if the idea of a week of ten-minute adjustments is more than you have capacity for, doing nothing is a defensible plan.

Light is the lever that actually moves a body clock

Here the guidance is more solid. Ireland's HSE advises bringing your baby outdoors early in the day, saying it "helps them make the hormone melatonin, which is good for sleep", and repeats the advice in its bedtime routine guidance for older babies. Basis, run with Durham University's Parent-Infant Sleep Lab, says you can support your infant's sleep consolidation by regularly exposing them to daylight during the day, and notes that a baby's circadian rhythm starts to develop from around four months in fits and starts.

So the practical shape of a clock-change week is: get outside in the morning light, keep evenings dim, and let the light do the work rather than the schedule.

Evening light

The HSE's night-time advice is to use a dim yellow or red light rather than a bright or blue one, and to keep screens away from your baby during the wind-down, because bright light interferes with sleep. The NHS gives the same advice for under-fives: no screens in the 30 to 60 minutes before bed.

Melatonin supplements are not the answer

This comes up every October and the answer is unambiguous. Ireland's HSE states: "Do not give your child melatonin supplements. They are not recommended for young children unless a doctor advises it."

The AAP's dedicated page adds why. Melatonin is not a sleeping pill. In the United States it is sold as an unregulated dietary supplement, and between 2012 and 2021 there were more than 260,000 child poisoning reports involving it, with some children needing hospital care and two deaths. One study found some products contained far more melatonin than the label claimed. The AAP says it should only be used after a discussion with your paediatrician.

In the UK, melatonin is a prescription-only medicine. It is not sold over the counter, it is not appropriate for a baby, and nothing on this page should be read as a suggestion to use it. This page gives no amounts of any medicine.

What does not change

Whatever the clock says, the sleep itself is the same: on the back, in their own clear, flat, firm sleep space, in your room for at least the first six months, room at a comfortable temperature, cot kept clear. An hour of daylight moving does not change a single safer-sleep rule.

A realistic plan for the week

If you want a version of the AAP's advice that fits a baby rather than a school-age child, this is what it amounts to. From about a week before, move naps and bedtime by roughly 10 minutes every day or two in the direction the clock is going. Move the whole day, not just bedtime — wake time, feeds and naps included — because a bedtime shifted on its own simply becomes a bedtime your baby is not tired for. Get outside in the morning each day of that week. Keep the wind-down identical, since the routine is the signal your baby actually recognises.

The week afterwards

Expect a few days of early waking whichever direction the clocks moved, and hold the new times rather than chasing them. If your baby is waking an hour early, treating it as morning — curtains open, lights on, breakfast — does more to reset the day than resettling in the dark. Naps will usually resettle within about a week without intervention.

When to ask

Speak to your health visitor or public health nurse if your baby's sleep has not resettled a couple of weeks after the change, if their total sleep has dropped well below the published range for their age, or if the disruption came with feeding problems, illness or distress rather than with the clocks. Never give a baby a sleep medicine or supplement without a clinician's instruction.