AUT · Now boarding
How many days until autumn?
Autumn falls on ….
Counted in your own time zone, —.
This counts to 1 September, the start of meteorological autumn. The equinox falls around 22 September.
Two names, one season
Autumn and fall are the same three months — September, October and November — and which word you use says more about where you learned English than about the weather. Both were in use in Britain in the seventeenth century; one crossed the Atlantic and stayed while the other faded at home.
The season that starts on a Monday
For a great many people autumn does not begin on a date at all. It begins when school does, when the office refills, when the calendar suddenly has things in it again. That is usually the first week of September, which is why 1 September holds up better as a start line than the equinox three weeks later.
Counting down to the dark
Autumn is the run-up to the clocks going back, which in most of Europe and North America happens in late October or early November and takes an hour of evening light with it overnight. If what you are really counting is daylight, that date is the one worth having in front of you.
Questions
When does autumn start?
1 September by the meteorological definition. The autumn equinox is around 22 September.
Is autumn the same as fall?
Yes — the same season, and both words are English. Fall is the more common term in North America.
When do the clocks go back?
Late October in the UK and EU, early November in most of the US. It is not the same weekend in both.