{"id":256453,"date":"2025-12-29T16:42:11","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T16:42:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/256453\/"},"modified":"2025-12-29T16:42:11","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T16:42:11","slug":"could-earth-have-25-hour-days-in-the-future-what-scientists-say-firstpost","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/256453\/","title":{"rendered":"Could Earth have 25-hour days in the future? What scientists say \u2013 Firstpost"},"content":{"rendered":"

Our 24-hour day measures Earth\u2019s rotation relative to the Sun, known as a solar day. This is slightly longer than Earth\u2019s rotation relative to distant stars (a sidereal day), because Earth is also moving along its orbit around the Sun. But could there be 25-hour days in the future?<\/p>\n

Will Earth soon have a 25-hour day?<\/p>\n

Everyone knows there are 24 hours in a day. This is based on the rotation of the Earth relative to the position of the Sun. But did you know that there could one day be 25-hour days? I While it may sound like science fiction, it\u2019s not. Scientists say it could happen millions of years from now.<\/p>\n

But what do we know? How would it happen?<\/p>\n

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s take a closer look.<\/p>\n

Earth\u2019s 24-hour day<\/strong>First, let\u2019s examine the Earth\u2019s 24-hour day.<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cThe origin of our time system of 24 hours in a day, with each hour subdivided into 60 minutes and then 60 seconds, is complex and interesting,\u201d Dr Nick Lomb, consultant curator of astronomy at the Sydney Observatory, told ABC.<\/p>\n

The idea comes from the ancient Egyptians, who used sundials.<\/p>\n

They divided the day into 10 hours, with a twilight period at the beginning and
\nanother at the end, and the night into 12 hours.<\/a><\/p>\n

\"\"\/A visitor sits near a limestone fragment dating to the reign of the ancient Egyptian 19th dynasty king Merneptah (1213-1203 BC) on display at the Grand Egyptian Museum in Giza. AFP<\/b><\/p>\n

\u201cNight-time was divided into 12 hours, based on the observations of stars. The Egyptians had a system of 36 star groups called \u2018decans\u2019 \u2014 chosen so that on any night one decan rose 40 minutes after the previous one,\u201d Lomb added.<\/p>\n

\u201cTables were produced to help people determine the time at night by observing the decans. Amazingly, such tables have been found inside the lids of coffins, presumably so that the dead could also tell the time.\u201d<\/p>\n

Later, the ancient Babylonians divided hours and minutes into 60 units each, using the sexagesimal (base-60) system they inherited from the Sumerians. This structure was eventually locked in by the first mechanical clocks, which emerged in Europe towards the end of
\nthe 16th century. It remains the system we use today.<\/a><\/p>\n

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD<\/p>\n

This measures Earth\u2019s rotation relative to the Sun \u2014 known as a solar day. However, Earth is also rotating on its axis while orbiting the Sun, which is why a solar day is slightly longer than a sidereal day (a full rotation relative to distant stars).<\/p>\n

How would it become 25 hours?<\/strong>Because the Earth\u2019s rotation is slowing \u2014 albeit extremely slowly.<\/a><\/p>\n

This happens due to the pull of the Moon\u2019s gravity on Earth. The Moon creates tidal bulges in the oceans, and because these bulges are not perfectly aligned with the Moon, they exert a small braking force on Earth\u2019s rotation.<\/p>\n

NASA explains that the Moon\u2019s gravitational pull \u201ccauses the oceans to bulge slightly, and this interaction acts like a brake, slowing Earth\u2019s rotation over time\u201d.<\/p>\n

Earth\u2019s spin is also affected, to a much lesser extent, by melting glaciers, shifting ocean mass, and movements within the planet\u2019s core and mantle.<\/p>\n

The change itself is tiny. It doesn\u2019t add seconds to the clock, but milliseconds \u2014 roughly 1.7 milliseconds per century. But when measured across hundreds of millions or even billions of years, these tiny changes add up.<\/p>\n

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS ADScientists estimate that Earth could experience a 25-hour day in roughly 200 million years, give or take.<\/a><\/p>\n

This, however, is nothing new.<\/p>\n

Earth\u2019s rotation has been changing throughout its history.<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Moon creates tidal bulges in the oceans, and because these bulges are not perfectly aligned with the Moon, they exert a small braking force on Earth\u2019s rotation. AFP<\/b><\/p>\n

As Sarah Millholland, an assistant professor of physics at MIT, told Live Science, \u201cThe Earth has experienced days that were both shorter and longer than it is now at different points in history.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAbout a billion years ago, the length of a day was only about 19 hours,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n

In fact, geological evidence from ancient coral growth rings and tidal sediments suggests that hundreds of millions of years ago, Earth experienced more than 400 days per year, with each day lasting just over 21 hours.<\/p>\n

Shortly after Earth formed, a day may have lasted less than 10 hours. There have also been periods when days were longer than 24 hours \u2014 though not for long.<\/p>\n

Should we be worried?<\/strong><\/p>\n

Probably not.<\/p>\n

Konstantin Batygin, a professor of planetary science at Caltech, told Live Science,\u00a0\u201cThe change in Earth\u2019s spin rate is happening gradually enough that evolutionary processes can adapt to the changes over time.\u201d<\/p>\n

STORY CONTINUES BELOW THIS AD<\/p>\n

\u201cThe relative change in orbital speed would not be noticeable in daily life,\u201d Batygin added.<\/p>\n

Even today, Earth\u2019s rotation is not perfectly steady. Because of small variations, scientists occasionally add \u201cleap seconds\u201d to atomic clocks to keep our timekeeping in sync with Earth\u2019s rotation. As the International Earth Rotation and Reference Systems Service (IERS) notes, leap seconds are added when Earth\u2019s rotation drifts by more than 0.9 seconds from atomic time.<\/p>\n

In short, a 25-hour day isn\u2019t a sign of impending planetary upheaval \u2014 just a reminder that even something as constant as time is not immune from cosmic forces.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Our 24-hour day measures Earth\u2019s rotation relative to the Sun, known as a solar day. This is slightly…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":256454,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[270],"tags":[99618,132806,132805,132811,132810,132813,18,132816,132800,132801,132802,132814,19,17,132808,132807,132812,10626,60894,132809,132817,132815,133,451,17135,48089,132803,132804,65],"class_list":{"0":"post-256453","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-space","8":"tag-earth-day","9":"tag-earth-in-hindi","10":"tag-earth-map","11":"tag-earth-pro","12":"tag-earth-proxy","13":"tag-earth-radius","14":"tag-eire","15":"tag-good-earth","16":"tag-google-earth","17":"tag-google-earth-earth","18":"tag-google-earth-google-earth","19":"tag-google-earth-pro","20":"tag-ie","21":"tag-ireland","22":"tag-live-earth","23":"tag-mama-earth","24":"tag-mass-of-earth","25":"tag-moon","26":"tag-planet-earth","27":"tag-proxy","28":"tag-radius-of-earth","29":"tag-save-earth","30":"tag-science","31":"tag-space","32":"tag-sun","33":"tag-the-earth","34":"tag-what-is-earth","35":"tag-what-is-the","36":"tag-world"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115803858240401519","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256453","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=256453"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/256453\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/256454"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=256453"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=256453"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=256453"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}