Have you ever wondered what time of night is best to hunt for ghosts, or witness some paranormal activity? Well, you aren’t alone, in fact this is a question I get asked quite often.

First of all, to just answer your question quickly, the general consensus for the best time for paranormal activity seems to be about 3 AM, but there is a bit more to it that I’ll cover in this post. 

So let’s get right to it!

What Is The Best Time For Paranormal Activity?

It would seem that this is not an absolute given, as paranormal investigation groups, research, and top ghost hunters all seem to disagree just a little bit about what the best time is. Some people believe that the best time might, in fact, be midnight, otherwise known as the “witching hour.”

Some people believe about 3 AM is the best time as there are so many testimonies of people witnessing activity around this time.

Stil others believe dusk, the time between day and night, might, in fact, be the absolute best time to witness ghosts or spirits.

There are a few reasons for this disagreements, and it’s primarily anectodately based. Meaning, the more one group, or one individual witnesses activity at a certain time, the more likely they are to believe that to be the best time.

Now, ghosts, spirits, and all sorts of other paranormal beings have been witnessed during the day, during the night, and just about any other time. One of the biggest reasons that people believe that the best time to witness activity at night might not have anything to do with the witching hour or any other beliefs, but may, in fact, have to do with our improved abilities at night.

In the evening, when most people are sleeping, we, and the spirits do not have any of the distractions that come with the daytime. People aren’t bustling around graveyards or haunted buildings; there isn’t the solar interference that comes with sunlight, and the world is simply quieter.

Many people believe that this is simple when spirits and paranormal beings prefer to be out because they are less disturbed in general. It is also certainly much easier for us to observe these things with equipment like full spectrum cameras or infrared thermometers.

There are also a few leading paranormal researchers that believe that it requires less energy for spirits to appear after the sun goes down, as there is less thermal energy for them to compete with. This is similar to the reasons that we believe the appearance of ghosts and spirits cause cold spots.

let’s talk a little bit about why each time might be plausibly the best for ghost hunting or paranormal activity.

Dawn Or Dusk For Paranormal Activity

There is a group of researchers that really believe that a “time between times” like the dawn, dusk, equinoxes, solstices, or even the changing of a season, might have the powerful ability to reveal more paranormal beings. This belief might have come partly from popular culture and Hollywood, as movies about Halloween would certainly have us believe that there is a dramatic increase in ghost activity that time of year.

However, what little bit of paranormal research we have available to us, would tell us that ambient EMF energy is much higher in the fall and winter, which could help to entice spirits to appear for that reason.

Is Midnight The Best Time For Ghost Hunting?

There are certainly a few good reasons to believe that right at midnight might well be the best time to witness paranormal activity or go ghost hunting. First of all, it aligns with our first thought, as midnight is the time exactly between two days, which may on its own have powerful implications.

Next, many authors and screenwriters have used midnight throughout history as a common time for paranormal occurrences. A few examples would be:

A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens: In his famous novel, Charles Dickens has the ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future each appear to Scrooge at exactly Midnight.

Edgar Allen Poe: I Can’t for the life of me remember which Poem I read it in, but Edgar Allen Poe wrote in one of his famous poems, that Midnight, belongs to the dead.

Macbeth by William Shakespeare: Many early stories, even much earlier than the time of Shakespeare, believed that Witches were most likely to cast spells at Midnight. Shakespeare kept up this belief by having the three witches in his famous tale “Macbeth” gather at midnight.

There are many more examples but I don’t want to overwhelm you. The bottom line is, midnight has long been associated with paranormal activity, and it isn’t just popular culture. In fact, many paranormal researchers and investigators will probably tell you that they’ve had many sightings at midnight.

Is The Witching Hour The Best Time For Ghost Hunting Or Paranormal Sightings?

Alright, finally we’ve come to what is most likely the absolute best time for paranormal activity and ghost hunting, and that is the Witching Hour, or approximately the hour between 3 a.m. and 4 a.m.

Many people believe that the witching hour, sometimes known as the “devil’s hour,” may have originated with Western Christian mythology. Western Christianity believed that the hour between 3 and 4 in the morning was the peak for supernatural activity because of the absence of prayer due to the canonical hours during the time period.

In certain areas, if women were caught outside un-escorted ruing this time, they were punished or executed on suspicion of witchcraft. This is what many people believe was the origination of the “witching hour,” however the term itself first appeared in publications in 1835.

Collectively, between the hours of approximately 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. is when the most reported sightings from paranormal investigators have been reported. So it would seem that both historical, and current evidence, would point to the witching hour being the best time to go ghost hunting or witness paranormal activity.

Final Thoughts On The Best Time For Ghost Hunting

Although the early morning will certainly be the best time for you to consider starting, as it seems to have the most evidence to back it up, in the end it will take trial and error to determine this for yourself.

I would encourage anyone who is starting to go ghost hunting to keep a thorough journal of any sightings, anything they hear, anything they witness, or even anything they feel. As well, be sure to note the exact location and time. This will help you to establish for yourself when peak activity times are for the locations you are scouting.

Certain ghosts or spirits may have their own preferred time to appear, so noting when your sightings are may help you to re-encounter the spirit.

Ultimately, no one can say for certain when the universal best time is, because things like the location in the world, time of year, type of location, and the spirit themselves may all play a role in when the sighting occurs.

I hope you enjoyed my article on the best times for paranormal activity, if you did, consider sharing!