LDS Missionary Daily Schedule: What a Typical Day Looks Like

Under the current Missionary Standards, a teaching missionary’s day begins at 6:30 a.m. and ends with bed between 9:30 and 10:30 p.m. The morning is prayer, exercise, preparation, personal study and planning; from 10:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. the day is finding, teaching and serving, with companion study, language study, records and meals inside that same block.

The sample LDS missionary daily schedule

This is the sample daily schedule as the current Missionary Standards set it out, for teaching missionaries serving away from home.

The block that surprises people is the long one. Eleven hours between 10:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. sounds like eleven hours of knocking on doors, and it is not — companion study, language study, records, health and safety checks, travel between appointments and up to two hours of meals all sit inside it. What the schedule does is set the boundaries of the day and protect the study time; how the middle is filled is planned by the companionship each morning.

What happens in the morning?

The first three and a half hours are the most tightly specified part of the day, and they are the same every day.

• Prayer at the start of the day.
• Exercise — 30 minutes. Protected time, not optional time, and one of the clearest signals in the standards that missionary health is treated as part of the work rather than as a distraction from it.
• Shower, breakfast and getting ready.
• Personal study — 60 minutes.
• Planning — 30 minutes. Where the day’s actual shape gets decided.

The standards describe the morning as a block rather than a rigid sequence, so the exact order can vary with local circumstances. The durations are the part that matters.

Personal study and planning

An hour of personal study, every day, before the day’s work starts. It is study of the scriptures and of the doctrine a missionary teaches — the single largest protected block in the schedule outside the work itself.

Planning is the half hour after it, and it is more consequential than it sounds. This is where a companionship decides who they are seeing, what they are teaching, where they are going and how the long middle of the day is going to be used. A day that goes well usually went well here.

What happens during the day?

From 10:00 a.m. the companionship is working. The standards list what belongs in that block, and it is a longer list than most people expect.

Finding, teaching and serving

The core of it: finding people who want to learn, teaching those who are learning, and serving in the community and the ward. In practice this also means working with members and local leaders, travelling between appointments, and following up with people they are already teaching.

Companion study

Thirty minutes, inside the working day, for companion study and preparing lessons. Two missionaries reviewing what they studied separately that morning and preparing together for the people they are about to teach.

Language study

Missionaries assigned to learn a language have 30 to 60 minutes of daily language study in this block. It applies to those who need it — a missionary serving in their own language does not have this, which is one of the ordinary ways two missionaries’ days differ from each other.

Records, health and safety

Updating records of the people they are teaching, and reviewing health and safety. Small, daily, and part of the schedule rather than squeezed in around it.

Meals

Meals sit inside the same block, with a limit of no more than two hours in total across the day. Dinner is often with a member family, which is why a mission’s evening rhythm can look quite different from one area to another.

What time do missionaries return home?

Missionaries return to their housing by 9:00 p.m. Under current standards, a companionship in a teaching appointment may return by 9:30 p.m. instead.

For families at home, this is the most practically useful line in the whole schedule — combined with the local time where they are serving, it tells you when their day is ending.

What time do missionaries go to bed?

Between 9:30 and 10:30 p.m. The half hour from 9:00 to 9:30 is for journal writing, preparing for bed and prayer.

The range rather than a single time is deliberate. It leaves room for travel, for a late appointment, and for the ordinary variation of living somewhere real.

What is different for new missionaries?

New missionaries and their trainers have additional study time during the first 12 weeks in the field — 30 to 60 minutes, inside the daytime block, on top of personal and companion study.

That is the main scheduled difference. Otherwise a new missionary’s day looks like everyone else’s from the first week, which is part of why the first transfer is the tiring one. Before the field there is also the MTC, which runs to its own timetable entirely — see what to bring to the MTC.

How does preparation day change the schedule?

One day each week is a preparation day, assigned by the mission president. It is time to refresh physically, spiritually and emotionally — not a day off from being a missionary, and not a day without missionary work in it.

The detail families most often miss is the 6:00 p.m. line. Preparation day activities finish then, and the evening returns to finding, teaching and serving — so a video call that starts late in their afternoon is running into the part of the day that is already spoken for.

How missionaries contact family

Under the current standards, missionaries may communicate with their family on their weekly preparation day, using letters, email, text messages, online messaging, phone calls and video chat. Contact is also permitted on special occasions — the standards give examples including Christmas, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and parents’ and siblings’ birthdays.

Two practical points for families. Missionaries are asked to initiate text conversations, online messaging, phone calls and video chats themselves, so waiting to be called rather than calling is the norm rather than a slight. And they are asked to prioritise communicating with parents first on preparation day — which is worth knowing if a wider family group chat has been going all week.

What happens on Sundays?

Sunday is not simply another weekday with the same blocks. Under current standards, Sabbath day activities include attending church, general conference and the Sunday general sessions of stake conference, and attending additional meetings such as ward council when invited. Missionaries also take part in the monthly fast.

Around those, Sunday is still a working day — often one of the most productive ones, because it is when members are available and when people being taught are most likely to attend church with them.

Does every mission follow exactly the same schedule?

No, and the standards say so themselves. The daily schedule is published as a sample, and mission presidents may adjust it for holidays, special events in the mission and similar circumstances.

Ordinary reasons a real day differs from the sample include:

• transfer days, zone conferences and mission-wide meetings;
• long-distance travel within a large area;
• local holidays, and the rhythms of the country served in;
• safety, weather or curfew guidance specific to an area or country;
• whether a missionary is learning a language, and whether they are in their first 12 weeks;
• service missionaries, who serve while living at home and follow their own standards rather than this schedule.

If your missionary describes a day that does not match the timetable above, the timetable is the thing that is approximate — not them.

Frequently asked questions

What time do LDS missionaries wake up?

6:30 a.m. in the current sample schedule, on both ordinary days and preparation days.

What time do LDS missionaries go to bed?

Between 9:30 and 10:30 p.m., after journal writing, preparing for bed and prayer from 9:00 p.m.

What do LDS missionaries do all day?

Between 10:00 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. they find people to teach, teach, serve, work with members and local leaders, do 30 minutes of companion study, do language study if assigned, update records, review health and safety, and eat — with meals capped at two hours in total.

How much do missionaries study each day?

60 minutes of personal study in the morning and 30 minutes of companion study during the day, plus 30–60 minutes of language study for those learning one and a further 30–60 minutes for new missionaries and trainers during the first 12 weeks.

Do missionaries get a day off?

Not exactly. One day a week is a preparation day for laundry, shopping, cleaning, rest, approved recreation and contacting family — but activities finish at 6:00 p.m. and the evening returns to finding, teaching and serving.

What day is P-day?

Whichever day the mission president assigns. It is one day each week and it varies between missions, so ask your missionary rather than assuming Monday.

Do missionaries exercise?

Yes — 30 minutes every morning is part of the schedule.

Is this schedule the same in every mission?

No. It is published as a sample and mission presidents may adjust it for holidays, special events and the needs of the mission.

Sources and further reading

Every time, duration and activity on this page was checked against the current published standards below.

If you are preparing to serve rather than following someone who is, the mission preparation checklist is the place to start — and the habits in this schedule are the ones worth building beforehand. If your call has arrived, what to do after receiving your mission call and the packing list come next. Families following a mission may find how to keep track of a missionary’s mission more useful.