You can trade outside regular market hours through pre-market and post-market sessions on NSE and BSE. Both sessions are available only for equity segment trading.
Pre-market session (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)
Starting 8 December 2025, NSE introduced a pre-open session for current month’s index and stock futures, similar to the equity cash market. 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 stop-loss 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.
Which contracts are included
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 opening price is determined
The system determines the opening (equilibrium) price based on 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 place orders for 500 contracts at ₹25,500. The system matches them at this price, and ₹25,500 becomes the day's opening price.
What happens to unmatched orders
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).
Post-market session (3:40 PM to 4:00 PM)
You can trade during the post-market session from 3:40 PM to 4:00 PM using only market orders.
Key features:
- Only market orders allowed: You can place buy or sell orders in the equity delivery segment using the Longterm (CNC) product type
- Closing price execution: Your market orders execute at the closing price (3:30 PM price)
- Limited activity: The session typically has low trading volume
Example: If Reliance closes at ₹800 at 3:30 PM and you place a market order to buy Reliance between 3:40 PM and 4:00 PM, your order will execute at ₹800 (the closing price).
You can monitor stock movements during the post-market session by viewing market depth between 3:40 PM and 4:00 PM.