You can trade outside regular market hours through pre-market and post-market sessions on NSE and BSE.
Pre-market session for equity (9:00 AM to 9:15 AM)
The pre-market session helps minimise volatility and discover opening prices of securities. You can participate in this session between 9:00 AM and 9:15 AM on both NSE and BSE.
How it works:
- Order collection (9:00 AM to 9:08 AM): You can place, modify, or cancel limit orders and market orders during the first 8 minutes
- Order matching: The exchange closes the order collection window anytime between 9:07 AM and 9:08 AM, then matches orders and confirms trades
- Price discovery: The session determines opening prices for securities
For detailed information about pre-market sessions, visit nseindia.com/products-services/equity-market-pre-open.
Pre-open session for futures (9:00 AM to 9:15 AM)
NSE introduced a pre-open session for the current month's index and stock futures on 8 December 2025. This 15-minute window allows you to place, modify, or cancel orders, but trades do not execute immediately.
- Order entry period (9:00 AM to 9:08 AM): You can place, modify, or cancel orders during this phase. The system closes the order entry window randomly between the 7th and 8th minute. Both limit and market orders are allowed, but you cannot place special order types like stoploss and Immediate or Cancel (IOC) orders. After Market Order (AMO) collection stops at 8:57 AM for NFO/BFO eligible contracts participating in the pre-open session.
- Order matching and trade confirmation (9:08 AM to 9:12 AM): The system matches buy and sell orders to determine a single opening price during this phase.
- Buffer period (9:12 AM to 9:15 AM): The buffer period serves as a transition period before regular trading starts at 9:15 AM.
The pre-open session applies to current-month futures on both stocks and indices. During the last five trading days before expiry, the session also includes next-month futures. If an underlying stock has a corporate action, such as a merger or demerger, on a particular day, its futures skip the pre-open session that day.
How the futures opening price is determined
The system determines the opening (equilibrium) price at the point where maximum buy and sell quantities match, where demand and supply meet most efficiently. If multiple prices qualify, the system selects the price with the least order imbalance (fewest unmatched orders). If a tie still exists, the system chooses the price closest to the previous day's closing price. If no trades occur during the pre-open session, the first trade in the normal session sets the opening price.
Example: During pre-open, buyers place orders for 500 contracts of Nifty futures at ₹25,500 and sellers also place orders for 500 contracts at ₹25,500. The system matches them at this price, and ₹25,500 becomes the day's opening price.
Limit orders that remain unmatched carry over to the normal market session with the same timestamp. The system converts market orders to limit orders at the discovered opening price and moves them to the normal session. If the system discovers no equilibrium price, market orders move at the base price (the previous day's closing price).
Closing Auction Session for F&O stocks (3:15 PM to 3:30 PM)
SEBI has introduced the Closing Auction Session (CAS) for F&O stocks, effective 3 August 2026. CAS replaces the Volume Weighted Average Price (VWAP) method of calculating closing prices for F&O stocks. In Phase 1, CAS applies only to stocks in the F&O segment. All other stocks continue to use the VWAP method.
For F&O stocks, continuous trading now stops at 3:15 PM:
- Regular trading (3:00 PM to 3:15 PM): Trading continues normally. The exchange simultaneously calculates VWAP for these 15 minutes, which becomes the reference price for the auction.
- Transition period (3:15 PM to 3:20 PM): Trading stops for F&O stocks, and no new orders are accepted. F&O contracts on these stocks continue to trade normally until 3:40 PM. The exchange carries forward existing open orders, except for stop loss orders, iceberg orders, and orders outside the 3% band on either side of the reference price.
- Order Entry Session I (3:20 PM to 3:25 PM): You can place, modify, or cancel both market and limit orders. The exchange shares an indicative price, total buy and sell quantities, and order imbalance.
- Order Entry Session II (3:25 PM to 3:30 PM): You can only place, modify, or cancel limit orders. You cannot place, modify, or cancel market orders. This session closes randomly between 3:28 PM and 3:30 PM to avoid last-minute order flooding. Once it closes, the exchange matches all orders at the price where the maximum number of trades can happen, and that becomes the official closing price.
Post-market session (3:50 PM to 4:00 PM)
You can trade during the post-market session from 3:50 PM to 4:00 PM using only market orders:
- Only market orders are allowed: You can place buy or sell orders in the equity delivery segment using the Longterm (CNC) or Margin Trading Facility (MTF) product type.
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Closing price execution: Your market orders execute at the closing price.
Example: If Reliance closes at ₹800 at 3:30 PM and you place a market order to buy Reliance between 3:50 PM and 4:00 PM, your order executes at ₹800 (the closing price).
A stock's closing price is determined by calculating the weighted average of all the trade prices between 3:00 PM and 3:30 PM for a non-F&O stock. The F&O stock's closing price is determined by the Closing Auction Session (CAS).
There will be no price movement between 3:50 PM and 4:00 PM, and all the trades will get executed at the closing price.