Turkey postpones the shift to summer time by one day

The Turkish government decided to postpone the change to summer time by one day. The rest of Europe will switch to summer time on Sunday 27 March, but in Turkey the time change will happen on Monday 28 March.^[1][2]

About 1.5 million students take Turkey's nationwide university entrance exam on 27 March.^[1][3] According to psychologist Suat Sabri Aslan, the students may feel undue stress if the clocks change on the same day as the exam.

Cem Gülan, president of Turkey's Private Schools Association, said that the exam would have had to be moved to another day if the date of the time change had not been changed. According to him, it takes one week for the human body to adjust to the time change, and even one problem for a student on the exam day might be disastrous.

Update, 26 October 2026: The clocks went forward on Monday 28 March 2011, as planned, and Turkey moved its dates again in 2014 and 2015.^[2] Since September 2016, Turkey keeps UTC+3 all year and no longer changes its clocks.^[2][4] See also: Turkey postpones the 2014 time switch to DST by one day.