Options Expiration Calendar 2026–2027: Every Monthly Opex Date

Standard monthly options expire on the third Friday of every month. When the market is closed that Friday, they expire the business day before. For the rest of 2026, the remaining monthly expirations are October 16, November 20 and December 18. In 2027 there is one holiday shift: the June monthly expires Thursday, June 17, because Juneteenth is observed on Friday, June 18.

The full options expiration calendar is below. After it comes the part a plain calendar leaves out: what to check on your own positions when one of these dates is a few days away.

Monthly options expiration dates for 2026 and 2027

Dates follow the third-Friday rule. I adjusted them against the NYSE holiday calendar as published on 2026-10-10. Quarterly months (March, June, September, December) are when stock options, index options and index futures all expire on the same day, which traders call "quad witching." Those days tend to have heavier volume.

Exchanges and the OCC can change a schedule, so check the exact date of anything you hold in your broker before you rely on it. The rule itself is stable: third Friday, or the business day before when that Friday is a holiday.

Weekly expirations that move to Thursday

Weekly options expire every Friday that is not a monthly expiration. These market-closed Fridays push weekly expirations to Thursday:

Holiday weeks catch people out. If you plan to "deal with it Friday" and Friday is closed, Thursday is your last trading session for those contracts.

How expiration actually works

The calendar date is only part of it. These mechanics decide what happens to a position on that date:

• Last trading day. For standard equity options, the last trading day is the expiration day itself. You can close or roll until the regular session ends.
• Automatic exercise. At expiration the OCC automatically exercises equity options that are in the money by $0.01 or more, unless the holder instructs otherwise. If you are short a call or put that finishes even slightly in the money, expect assignment.
• After-hours moves still count. A holder can submit exercise instructions after the close, and the stock can move after hours. A short option that looked safely out of the money at 4:00 p.m. can still be assigned. This is pin risk: price sitting near your strike as expiration approaches.
• AM-settled vs PM-settled index options. Standard monthly SPX options are AM-settled. Their last trading day is Thursday, and they settle on a special opening quotation Friday morning. SPXW weeklies and dailies are PM-settled on the expiration day. See Cboe's SPX product page for the specifications.

If you sell options for income, assignment is the line item that matters most. The cash-secured puts playbook covers what happens to your basis and your next trade once shares get put to you.

Expiry week: a four-step review for options sellers

The calendar tells you when. Your positions tell you what to do. On the Monday of an expiration week, I go through every short option expiring that Friday and put it in one of four buckets.

Worked example: a covered call in expiry week

Say you own 100 shares of a $50 stock and sold the October 16 $52 call for $1.10 when it had 30 days to expiry. On Monday, October 12, the stock trades at $51.60.

• The call is $0.40 out of the money with four days left. Gamma is now high, so a small move up puts it in the money.
• Buying back the call might cost about $0.70. That locks in $0.40 of the original $1.10.
• You could roll to the November 20 $53 call, which has 39 days to expiry, for a net credit. That keeps the shares and resets the clock.
• If you are happy to sell at $52, you can do nothing. Assignment at $52, plus the $1.10 premium, gives an effective exit of $53.10.

The prices here are illustrative, not live quotes. What generalizes is the process: decide on Monday, not on Friday at 3:55 p.m. Also, the "effective exit" is only right if your basis is right. After two or three rolls, most broker screens stop showing it. That problem is covered in true cost basis after rolls.

Why a calendar alone is not enough

An expiration calendar answers "when is opex?" It does not answer "what of mine expires, and how close to the money is it?" Once a book has a few tickers across two brokers and some rolled positions, you need a different view:

1. Group by expiration date, not by ticker. Expiry week is a date problem. You want everything expiring October 16 on one screen.
2. Show distance to strike. "In the money," "within 2%" and "far out of the money" decide which bucket a position goes in.
3. Keep spread legs together. An iron condor or vertical spread has to be judged as one structure. Multi-leg options tracking and per-leg P&L explain why a leg-by-leg view misleads you near expiration.
4. Carry roll history into the basis. A roll changes your break-even. Without that history, "let it get assigned" can look profitable when it isn't.

That is the job of an options portfolio tracker. Days to Expiry was named after that view. Your positions sync from IBKR Flex or a SnapTrade-connected broker, and the portfolio view sorts them by days to expiry, so the calendar above becomes a short list of decisions. For the wider framework of position sizing, concentration and income tracking, see options portfolio management.

FAQ

When do monthly options expire?

On the third Friday of the month. If the exchange is closed that Friday, expiration moves to the business day before, usually Thursday.

When is opex this month?

For October 2026 it is Friday, October 16. November 2026 is Friday, November 20, and December 2026 is Friday, December 18, a quarterly expiration.

Which 2026 and 2027 expirations move because of holidays?

June 2026 monthly options expired Thursday, June 18, because the market was closed for Juneteenth on Friday, June 19. In 2027 the June monthly moves to Thursday, June 17, because Juneteenth is observed on Friday, June 18. Weekly expirations also move to Thursday around Christmas 2026, New Year's Day 2027, Good Friday 2027 and Christmas 2027.

Do weekly options expire every Friday?

Weekly options on most optionable stocks and ETFs expire every Friday that is not a monthly expiration, and move to Thursday when that Friday is a market holiday. SPX, SPY and QQQ also list expirations on other weekdays, so check the specific contract.

Options involve risk and are not suitable for every investor. This article is educational and not investment advice. Confirm expiration dates and settlement terms for each contract with your broker or the exchange.