Sleeping around an early
On at 6:00 am, off at 2:00 pm: 8h on shift and 16h between one ending and the next beginning.
In bed at 3:00 pm, 1 hour after clocking off. The rows differ only in when you get up.
| Up at | Cycles | Until the next start |
|---|---|---|
| 10:45 pm | 5 cycles | 7h 15m |
| 9:15 pm | 4 cycles | 8h 45m |
| 7:45 pm | 3 cycles | 10h 15m |
| 6:15 pm | 2 cycles | 11h 45m |
7h 30m asleep
Five cycles taken straight after clocking off, laid on an ordinary clock face.
Sleeping before the shift
The same sum run the other way: be up at 4:30 am, which is an hour and a half before you are due on, and count whole cycles back from there.
| In bed | Cycles | Time asleep |
|---|---|---|
| 8:45 pm | 5 cycles | 7h 30m |
| 10:15 pm | 4 cycles | 6h |
| 11:45 pm | 3 cycles | 4h 30m |
| 1:15 am | 2 cycles | 3h |
Splitting it in two
One block after clocking off and a second before clocking on. If the two will not fit between the shifts, the total below says so.
Both blocks together
7h 30m
In bed at 3:00 pm until 7:45 pm, then again at 1:15 am until 4:30 am, with 5h 30m awake in between.
Those two do not fit between one shift and the next. Take fewer cycles in one of them.
Earlies across the year
An early's alarm, an hour and a half before the start, is 4:30 am. That is dark on every day of the year in London, New York, Johannesburg, Cape Town and Sydney. London's earliest sunrise, 4:43 am in the middle of June, comes closest.
The 6:00 am start is the moment the night rota ends, so it is light on the same dates. In London that is from about 19 April to 24 August, after a few light days in late March that the clock change takes away. New York has light starts from late April to early August, and Johannesburg from late September to the end of February. Cape Town has them from about 20 October to 25 January. In Sydney in 2026 they run from the middle of September to 3 October, and again from the end of October to the middle of January. For the rest of the year the shift starts in the dark.
Five cycles before the shift count back from the 4:30 am alarm to 8:45 pm. That bedtime is in daylight only in London, from the middle of May to early August. In the other four cities it is dark all year. Four cycles, from 10:15 pm, is dark everywhere on every day of the year. The 4:30 am wake page gives the evening's bedtimes for that alarm.
The clocks change in the small hours, inside the sleep before an early. On the night they go forward, that sleep is an hour shorter than the table says. On the night they go back, it is an hour longer. In 2026 they are 29 March and 25 October in London, 8 March and 1 November in New York, and 4 October and 5 April in Sydney. Johannesburg and Cape Town have no such nights.
Taken after the shift instead, the sleep starts at 3:00 pm, an hour after clocking off. That is daylight in all five cities on every day of the year. Five cycles then run to 10:45 pm, with the next start still seven and a quarter hours away.
Sunrise and sunset: the NOAA solar equations, for each city centre in 2026, to the nearest minute.
Cycles are 90 minutes here and dropping off takes 15, as on the rest of the site, and the next shift is taken to start at the same time the following day. Rows that will not fit between two shifts are marked. That is the only judgement on the page: which arrangement suits your rota and your household is not something this site can know.
The other rotas
A run of days and nights together, with the switch days between them, is laid out on the rota planner.
- Nights
10:00 pm to 6:00 am
- Twelve-hour nights
7:00 pm to 7:00 am
- Lates
2:00 pm to 10:00 pm
- Twelve-hour days
7:00 am to 7:00 pm