Brighter afternoons and evenings are just around the corner.

Daylight saving time officially begins Sunday, March 10 at 2 a.m., “springing forward” clocks by one hour. For most people, this means setting clocks ahead one hour – assuming your smartphone and devices don’t handle the work for you – before they go to bed on Saturday night.

The change moves more daylight from the morning to the evening hours, making sunrise and sunset about an hour later than the day before.

The time change occurs a little more than a week before spring’s official arrival on March 19 at 10:06 p.m. CT.

DST will be in place until we “fall back” by one hour on Nov. 3.

The process of changing the clocks has a long and colorful history – you can read more via the Farmer’s Almanac here. The U.S. government’s National Institute of Standards and Technology also has an official explanation for the change:

“This change helps keep the hours of daylight coordinated with the time that most people are active. Proponents feel that this saves energy because in the spring and summer months, more people may be outside in the evening and not using energy at home. There are, however, ongoing debates about how much energy is saved.”

The current DST was set by the Energy Policy Act of 2005 which went into effect in 2007 and extended DST by four to five weeks.