COMEX Session Times: When Does the COMEX Market Open and Close?

If you trade gold, silver, or copper futures, you have probably asked yourself this question at least once: when exactly does the COMEX market open and close? The answer is not as simple as a single fixed hour, because COMEX operates on a schedule that spans nearly the entire trading day, with different sessions serving different purposes. Understanding these COMEX session times is essential whether you are placing a trade from New York, London, or Mumbai.

What Are COMEX Session Times?

COMEX, the Commodity Exchange division of CME Group, is the primary futures exchange for metals like gold, silver, and copper. Its regular trading hours for open outcry are 08:20 to 13:30 Eastern Time. However, the vast majority of modern trading happens electronically through the CME Globex platform, which extends the COMEX market hours far beyond that narrow window.

The electronic session typically runs from 6:00 PM ET on Sunday through 5:00 PM ET on Friday, with a daily maintenance break from 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM ET. For gold futures specifically, the active electronic session opens at 08:20 ET, with settlement around 13:30 ET. In other words, the COMEX market open time for most practical purposes is Sunday evening in the United States, while the exchange remains accessible throughout the week with only brief pauses.

What Is the COMEX Market Closing Time Today?

The COMEX market closing time today depends on which session you are tracking. For a standard weekday, the electronic trading pause occurs at 5:00 PM ET, resuming one hour later at 6:00 PM ET. The weekly close for gold and silver futures is Friday at 5:00 PM ET, after which the market remains closed until Sunday evening.

This daily one-hour gap is not merely a technicality. Orders may not execute during the maintenance window, and liquidity conditions immediately before and after the pause can differ significantly from more active periods. Traders who hold positions through this window need to be aware that their exposure carries different risk characteristics during the break.

COMEX Market Open Time in India: What Traders Need to Know

For traders in India, the COMEX market open time in India translates to a significantly different clock schedule. When COMEX opens for its electronic session at 6:00 PM ET on Sunday, that is approximately 3:30 AM IST on Monday. The regular open outcry session at 08:20 ET corresponds to 5:50 PM IST. Meanwhile, the daily settlement window around 13:30 ET falls at roughly 11:00 PM IST.

This means Indian traders often find that the most liquid and volatile periods in COMEX metals occur during their late evening and early morning hours. The COMEX market hours in India effectively span from around 3:30 AM IST through the following morning, with the New York active window aligning with India’s evening. For anyone trading gold or silver from India, this time zone gap is not a minor inconvenience — it fundamentally shapes when they can monitor positions and react to market moves.

Why COMEX Session Times Matter for Position Management

Understanding session times is one thing. Staying on top of your positions during those sessions is another challenge entirely. A gold futures trader in India who holds positions overnight faces a practical problem: the moments of highest volatility — US data releases, COMEX settlement windows, and the New York/London overlap — often occur when they are away from their trading desk.

This is where Camovia Tray becomes genuinely useful. It turns your MT5 or MT4 terminal into a system tray tool, allowing you to hover over the tray icon and see live quotes for your chosen instruments without opening the full platform. During those volatile COMEX windows, you can glance at your gold or silver positions from the tray, check unrealized P&L, and even close a position with a two-step confirmation — all without disrupting whatever else you are doing. Since the quote and position data are read locally from your terminal and never leave your computer, you maintain a layer of privacy that feels appropriate for a tool that sits quietly in the background of your desktop.

The Bottom Line on COMEX Session Times

COMEX is not a market with a single open and close. It is a nearly continuous electronic marketplace with a narrow open outcry window, a daily maintenance pause, and a weekend break. For traders outside the United States — particularly in India — the COMEX market open time in India means the most important hours often fall outside normal working hours. Knowing the schedule is the first step. Being able to act on it, without opening your terminal or broadcasting your trading activity to anyone looking at your screen, is a practical advantage that tools like Camovia Tray are built to provide.