How many days until New Year's Eve?
A live countdown to the next 31 December. It resolves the next occurrence from today, so on 1 January it quietly starts counting to the following one.
Live countdown
How this date is worked out
31 December, fixed, resolved as the next occurrence on or after today. This is the one countdown on the site where the target and the celebration are almost the same moment: the clock reaches zero at midnight on 31 December, which is the start of the day, and the party is at the other end of it. Through the day itself the page shows the time remaining until midnight — which is the number most people actually want on 31 December.
The night itself
The modern public celebration is younger than you might expect. The Times Square ball drop began on 31 December 1907, after the city banned the fireworks the New York Times had been using; the ball has been lowered every year since, apart from wartime blackouts in 1942 and 1943. Sydney's harbour fireworks, now among the first major displays the world sees, grew into their current form in the 1990s.
In Scotland the night is Hogmanay, with its own traditions: first-footing, where the first person to cross the threshold after midnight should be a dark-haired man bearing symbolic gifts, and the singing of Auld Lang Syne, adapted by Robert Burns from an older folk song in 1788 and now a global fixture. Elsewhere the customs are wonderfully specific: twelve grapes at midnight in Spain, one for each chime; red underwear in Italy; smashed plates in Denmark; a pot of Hoppin' John in the American South.
Which places celebrate first
The first inhabited places to reach midnight are Kiritimati in Kiribati and the Line Islands at UTC+14, followed by Samoa and Tonga. Auckland, Sydney and Tokyo come next among the large cities. The last are Baker Island and Howland Island, uninhabited US territories at UTC-12, which reach the new year a full 26 hours after Kiritimati. Because this page counts in your own time zone, your countdown reaches zero exactly when your calendar turns.
Related countdowns
If what you actually want is the number of days to New Year's Day itself, that is one day later. For a specific year, there is a dedicated New Year's 2027 page. And if you are counting down to a resolution deadline, a fiscal year end or anything else that happens to sit at the turn of the year, the custom countdown takes a time of day as well as a date.
The next six New Year's Eves
Whether it lands on a weekend makes a considerable difference to the evening, and to the price of everything:
| Year | Date | Day of the week | Days from today |
|---|---|---|---|
| Calculating… | |||
Questions people ask
Does the countdown reach zero at midnight on the 30th or the 31st?
At the start of 31 December, because "days until" counts whole days remaining. Through 31 December the page switches to showing the time left in the day, so from that morning onwards you are looking at a genuine countdown to the midnight everyone celebrates.
Will this page still work in future years?
Yes. There is no year in the source. It resolves the next 31 December from your device clock on every load and rolls forward on its own.
Which time zone does it use?
Yours, as reported by your device. That is the right answer for a New Year countdown, since the new year genuinely arrives at different moments around the world.
How many weeks until New Year’s Eve?
The line under the clock gives the figure in weeks and in months as well as days.
Count down to something else
Every page below works the same way and stays correct on its own. For a date of your own — a holiday, an exam, a due date, a launch — use the countdown and date difference calculator.