What Time Does the COMEX Market Open? A Complete Guide to COMEX Trading Hours

It’s 3 a.m. and your phone buzzes with a price alert. Gold is moving. You roll over, grab your laptop, and open MetaTrader—only to wait for the platform to load, log in, and navigate to the chart. By the time you’re ready to act, the initial spike has already faded. This is the reality for many traders who watch the COMEX market: the most significant moves often happen outside convenient hours, and every second spent fumbling with software is a second lost.

Understanding exactly when the COMEX market opens—and how its schedule affects your ability to monitor and manage positions—is essential for anyone trading gold, silver, copper, or other metals. This guide breaks down the COMEX market hours in plain terms, explains what those hours mean for traders in different regions, and offers a practical way to stay connected to the market without being chained to your trading terminal.

Understanding the COMEX Market and Its Global Role

COMEX, short for the Commodity Exchange, is a division of the CME Group and one of the world’s primary venues for trading metals futures and options. While it has physical roots in New York, nearly all COMEX trading today happens electronically through the CME Globex platform. This means the exchange operates on a schedule that accommodates traders across multiple time zones, from New York to London to Mumbai and beyond.

The contracts traded on COMEX include some of the most widely followed benchmarks in the commodities world: gold futures (GC), silver futures (SI), copper futures (HG), and others. Because these metals are priced in US dollars and heavily influenced by US economic data and monetary policy, the COMEX market hours naturally revolve around the US trading day—but with extended sessions that stretch nearly around the clock.

COMEX Market Open Time: The Official Schedule

The most straightforward answer to “what time does the COMEX market open” depends on whether you’re asking about the weekly open or the daily resumption of trading.

Weekly Open: The COMEX market opens for the trading week on Sunday at 6:00 PM Eastern Time. This is when the electronic trading session begins, and it runs continuously until the following Friday at 5:00 PM ET.

Daily Schedule: From Sunday through Thursday, the COMEX market has a daily maintenance break from 5:00 PM to 6:00 PM ET. When this break ends at 6:00 PM ET, the market reopens for the next trading day. On Friday, the market closes for the week at 5:00 PM ET and does not reopen until Sunday evening.

It’s worth noting that the COMEX market hours are typically quoted in Eastern Time, which shifts twice a year with Daylight Saving Time. During US Eastern Daylight Time (roughly March to November), the Sunday open at 6:00 PM ET corresponds to 22:00 UTC. During Eastern Standard Time (November to March), the same 6:00 PM ET open corresponds to 23:00 UTC.

Some sources also reference Central Time, since the CME Group is headquartered in Chicago. In Central Time, the weekly open is at 5:00 PM CT, and the daily maintenance window runs from 4:00 PM to 5:00 PM CT.

COMEX Market Hours and the Indian Trader: What “COMEX Market Open Time in India” Really Means

For traders in India, the COMEX schedule requires a mental conversion that can be surprisingly tricky because of the half-hour offset and the Daylight Saving shift.

When the US observes Daylight Saving Time (summer months in the Northern Hemisphere), the COMEX market open time in India is 3:30 AM IST (the Sunday 6:00 PM ET open translates to 3:30 AM Monday morning IST). The daily resumption at 6:00 PM ET corresponds to 3:30 AM IST as well.

When the US is on Standard Time (winter months), the COMEX market open time in India shifts to 4:30 AM IST. The daily maintenance break runs from 3:30 AM to 4:30 AM IST during standard time.

For many Indian traders, this means the most active and liquid period for COMEX metals—when US and European participants are both in the market—overlaps with the Indian evening and night. The MCX, India’s largest commodity exchange, schedules its evening session specifically to align with this window. During US Daylight Saving Time, the active COMEX session runs roughly from 6:30 PM to 12:00 AM IST. When the US returns to Standard Time, that window shifts to approximately 7:30 PM to 1:00 AM IST.

This overlap explains why Indian traders often find themselves monitoring gold and silver prices late into the evening. The MCX evening session, which extends to 11:30 PM IST or 11:55 PM IST depending on the season, is designed to let traders react to COMEX price action in real time.

COMEX Market Closing Time Today: When Does Trading Stop?

The counterpart to the open is the close, and here too the schedule has nuances worth understanding. The COMEX market closing time today—if today is a regular weekday—is 5:00 PM ET for the daily pause. The market then reopens at 6:00 PM ET for the next session.

On Fridays, the COMEX market closes for the week at 5:00 PM ET and remains closed until Sunday at 6:00 PM ET. This weekend closure is the only extended pause in the COMEX schedule during a normal trading week.

Holidays can alter these hours. The CME Group publishes a holiday calendar that specifies early closes or full closures around US public holidays. For instance, on days surrounding Independence Day or Thanksgiving, COMEX may close early at 1:00 PM ET or observe a modified schedule. Traders who hold positions through holidays should always check the official CME calendar to avoid surprises.

Why COMEX Market Hours Matter for Position Management

Knowing the COMEX market hours is not just trivia—it has practical consequences for how you manage risk and opportunity.

During the daily maintenance break (5:00 PM to 6:00 PM ET), orders may not execute, and the market is effectively paused. Conditions immediately before and after this break can differ from more active periods, sometimes with wider spreads or reduced liquidity. Traders who place stop-loss orders near the close of a session may find those orders filled at unexpected prices when the market reopens.

The most volatile periods for COMEX metals tend to coincide with the overlap between US and European trading hours, roughly 8:00 AM to 12:00 PM ET. This is when major US economic data is released, when the London metals market is active, and when volume and liquidity are at their highest. For traders in Asia, this window falls during their evening or late night—which brings us to a common problem.

The Challenge: Staying Connected Without Being Glued to the Terminal

Here’s the uncomfortable truth for many active traders: the moments when COMEX metals move most—and when you most need to act—often fall outside the hours when you want to be sitting in front of a trading terminal. If you’re in India, the peak COMEX session runs from around 6:30 PM to midnight or later. If you’re in Europe, it’s afternoon into evening. If you’re in the US, it’s morning into afternoon.

For swing traders or anyone with a day job, this creates a dilemma. You want to monitor your positions and react to price moves, but you don’t want to spend every evening staring at MetaTrader. You also don’t want to miss a critical price level because you stepped away from your desk.

This is where a tool like Camovia Tray can change the equation. Camovia Tray turns MT5 or MT4 into a system tray tool, letting you check live quotes and manage open positions without opening the full trading terminal. Hover over the tray icon and a compact panel shows your watchlist prices in real time. Open the positions view and you see your open trades—symbol, direction, lot size, entry price, and current P&L—all in one glance. If you need to close a position, it’s a two-step confirmation process right from that panel.

For a COMEX gold trader in Mumbai who wants to keep an eye on the market during the evening session while also having dinner with family, the difference is meaningful. The MT5 window stays hidden from the taskbar and Alt+Tab list. The tray icon can be disguised as a cloud drive or system utility. And crucially, the quote and position data stay on your computer—nothing is uploaded to an external server.

A Note on Data and Privacy

Traders who manage real money tend to care about where their data goes. Camovia Tray is designed with this in mind. All market quotes and position information are read directly from your local MT5 or MT4 terminal. Nothing about your positions, your watchlist, or your trading activity leaves your machine. There’s no cloud sync, no external analytics, no data mining. For traders who value privacy alongside convenience, this is a deliberate design choice.

Quick Reference: COMEX Market Hours at a Glance

Note: IST conversions assume the IST offset of UTC+5:30. Times are approximate and subject to CME holiday schedules.

Making the Most of COMEX Market Hours

The COMEX market’s near-24-hour schedule is a double-edged sword. It offers almost continuous access, but it also means the market never truly waits for you. The traders who handle this best are not the ones who watch every tick—they’re the ones who have a system for staying informed without burning out.

Understanding when the COMEX market opens and closes is the first step. Knowing that the daily break is a genuine pause in execution, that the Sunday open sets the tone for the week, and that the US-India time overlap creates a distinct trading window—these are practical insights that shape how you plan your sessions.

The second step is having tools that fit the reality of your schedule. If you’re monitoring gold or silver positions during the COMEX evening session but don’t want to keep MetaTrader front and center all night, a tray-based approach lets you stay connected on your terms. Camovia Tray is available on the Microsoft Store for Windows 10 and 11, with a free trial for new users. You can find more details at https://www.camovia.com.