Options Expiration Guide: Dates, Daily Expiries and 0DTE
An option has a last day, and almost everything about how it behaves comes back to that date. The premium you pay is mostly a price for the time left. Time decay speeds up as the date gets closer. A short option can be assigned. A long option that finishes in the money may be exercised, and one that finishes out of the money simply stops existing. This page collects the articles on this site that cover expiration, so you can read them in an order that makes sense.
Standard monthly equity options expire on the third Friday of the month, and many names also list weekly expirations. A small group of products, SPY and QQQ among them, list an expiration for every trading day, which is where the phrase 0DTE comes from: zero days to expiration. The pieces below start with the plain mechanics and work toward the same-day contracts, where the clock matters most.
Start here: how expiration works
- How Do Options Expiration Dates Work? A Trader Explains
- What Happens When an Option Expires? (ITM vs OTM)
- What Is a Strike Price? How to Actually Pick One
- Call Option vs Put Option: The Actual Difference
- What Time Do Options Expire: Trading Hours and Expiration Day Cutoffs
- OPEX Explained: Monthly Options Expiration and the Third-Friday Calendar
- Options Expiration Calendar 2026-2027: Monthly and Quarterly Dates
Daily expiries and 0DTE
- 0DTE Options: What They Are and Why They’re Riskier
- Theta Decay Explained: What It Actually Costs You
- Rolling an Options Position: What It Costs and When It Helps
- Assignment Risk on Short Options: What Actually Triggers It
- Short-Dated Options Explained: Weeklies, Daily Expirations and 0DTE
- Trading Options on Expiration Day: What Changes in the Final Hours
- SPY 0DTE Options Cutoff Time: 4:00 and 4:15 ET Explained
- What happens if you hold a 0DTE option into the close
- 0DTE vs weekly options: decay, risk and cost
- 0DTE Options Profit and Loss at Expiration Calculator
- Monthly OPEX Week Price Action and Pinning Explained
Pricing the time you are buying
- How to Read Implied Volatility (IV) in Options
- Options Greeks Explained: Delta, Theta, Gamma in Plain Terms
- How to Prepare for FOMC Options Trading: IV Crush Risk
- LEAPS Options Explained: Contracts That Trade Like Stock
- Implied volatility crush after earnings explained
- How FOMC week affects options expiration and premiums
Choosing a contract
- Options for Beginners: What Happens When You Buy a Call
- Credit Spread vs Debit Spread: The Real Difference
- Vertical Spread vs Single Leg Option: The Real Cost
- How Long to Hold an Options Trade Before You Exit
- Can You Lose More Than You Invest in Options?
- Options Breakeven Price Calculator
All examples across these articles are illustrative. Options carry risk of loss, including the full premium paid. See the risk disclosure.