Short answer: Yes. Fiscal year 2027 began on Oct 1, 2026 and runs through Sep 30, 2027. Congress writes the FY2027 spending bills during the months before the year starts, which is why the tracker already follows all twelve.
The federal fiscal year runs from October 1 to September 30, and it takes its name from the calendar year in which it ends. That one rule answers most of the questions people search for. Fiscal year 2027, written FY2027 or FY27, starts on October 1, 2026 and ends on September 30, 2027.
- FY2026 (FY26): Oct 1, 2025 through Sep 30, 2026
- FY2027 (FY27): Oct 1, 2026 through Sep 30, 2027 · the fiscal year we are in today
- FY2028 (FY28): Oct 1, 2027 through Sep 30, 2028 · starts Oct 1, 2027
What a fiscal year is
A fiscal year is the twelve month period an organization uses for its budget and its books. It does not have to match the calendar. A company, a state, or a national government picks the start date that fits the way it plans and spends money, and then every budget, report, and deadline runs on that clock.
"FY" is simply short for fiscal year. The number after it is the year the period ends, not the year it begins. So when a headline in the summer of 2026 talks about "the 2027 budget," it means the spending year that begins that October, not a year that is still more than a year away.
Fiscal year versus calendar year
The calendar year runs January 1 through December 31. The federal fiscal year starts three months earlier, which means it straddles two calendar years:
- October, November, and December of 2026 belong to FY2027.
- January through September of 2027 also belong to FY2027.
- So Thanksgiving 2026, Christmas 2026, and New Year's Day 2027 all fall inside the same fiscal year.
Most people never need to think about this, because personal income taxes, paychecks, and household budgets run on the calendar year. The fiscal year matters when you follow what Congress spends, what agencies can pay for, and when the government could shut down.
Why the fiscal year matters for appropriations
Every year Congress passes twelve regular appropriations bills that fund most of the federal government's day to day operations: the military, national parks, the FBI, highway grants, medical research, and much more. Each bill is written for one specific fiscal year, and the fiscal year is in its legal name. The defense bill for this cycle, for example, is formally a "Department of Defense Appropriations Act, 2027." When people say "the appropriations year," they mean the fiscal year.
The fiscal year shapes the whole process:
- The President's budget request is due the first Monday in February, about eight months before the fiscal year it covers begins. It is a proposal, and Congress is free to ignore it.
- The House and Senate Appropriations Committees write and mark up their bills in the spring and summer.
- The floor votes follow in the summer and fall, and the two chambers then have to agree on a single version of each bill.
- September 30 is the deadline. Whatever money has not been provided for the new fiscal year by then is not there on October 1.
Most of what the bills provide is available only during that fiscal year. Budget specialists call it one year money: an agency has to commit it before September 30 or lose the authority to use it. Some accounts get multiyear money, and a few get "no year" money that stays available until spent, which is common for construction and disaster relief.
What happens when September 30 arrives
If all twelve bills are law by October 1, the new fiscal year starts normally. That almost never happens. The usual fix is a continuing resolution, a stopgap law that keeps agencies running at roughly the prior year's levels for a set number of weeks while Congress keeps working. A fiscal year can run on one stopgap after another.
If neither the regular bills nor a stopgap is law when the old money runs out, funding lapses. A federal law called the Antideficiency Act bars agencies from spending money Congress has not provided, so affected agencies must stop work that is not tied to protecting life or property. That is a government shutdown. It only touches discretionary spending, the money in the twelve bills, which is why Social Security and Medicare payments keep going during a shutdown while national parks and many federal offices close.
You can see where each of the twelve FY2027 bills stands in both chambers on the tracker, and whether a shutdown is possible at the next deadline on the shutdown page.
A short history of the federal fiscal year
The October 1 start date is newer than most people assume. The federal government has used three different fiscal years.
1789 to 1842: the calendar year. For its first half century, the federal government ran its finances on the calendar year, January 1 through December 31.
1843 to 1976: July 1. An 1842 law moved the start of the fiscal year to July 1, beginning in 1843, with the first half of 1843 treated as a short transition period. Congress usually met over the winter, and a July start gave it the first months of each year to finish the spending bills before the money was needed.
1976 onward: October 1. By the 1970s, July was no longer enough time. Spending bills were routinely late, and Congress was also fighting with President Nixon over his refusal to spend money it had appropriated. The Congressional Budget and Impoundment Control Act of 1974 answered both problems. It limited a President's power to withhold appropriated funds, created the House and Senate Budget Committees and the Congressional Budget Office, set up the annual budget resolution, and moved the start of the fiscal year three months later, to October 1, to give Congress more time.
The switch left a gap. Fiscal year 1976 ended on June 30, 1976, and fiscal year 1977 did not start until October 1, 1976. The three months in between became their own budget period, known as the transition quarter, and you will still see it listed as "TQ" in historical budget tables.
The extra three months did not solve the problem it was meant to solve. Since the October 1 start took effect, Congress has finished all of its regular appropriations bills on time only four times: for fiscal years 1977, 1989, 1995, and 1997. Continuing resolutions have become a normal part of nearly every year, and funding lapses have become more frequent and longer. The shutdown that ran from December 22, 2018 to January 25, 2019 lasted 35 days, and the lapse that began on October 1, 2025, the first day of fiscal year 2026, lasted 43 days, the longest on record.
Other fiscal years you might run into
The federal fiscal year is only one of many, which is part of why the term confuses people.
- States: 46 states start their fiscal year on July 1. The exceptions are New York (April 1), Texas (September 1), and Alabama and Michigan (October 1, matching the federal government).
- Other countries: The United Kingdom, Canada, Japan, and India start on April 1. Australia starts on July 1.
- Companies: Many use the calendar year, but plenty do not. Microsoft's fiscal year ends June 30, and Walmart's ends January 31.
So "fiscal year 2027" can mean different months depending on who is talking. On this site, and in anything about Congress or federal spending, it always means October 1, 2026 through September 30, 2027.
Where FY2027 funding stands right now
Short answer: Right now the government is running on a stopgap, H.R. 6500, that keeps agencies funded at last year's levels through Dec 11, 2026. Of the twelve FY2027 appropriations bills that make up the discretionary budget, the House has passed 3, the Senate has passed 0, and 0 are law. The live table of every bill and both chambers is the tracker, and the shutdown question is answered on the shutdown page.
Quick answers
What fiscal year are we in? The federal fiscal year changes every October 1. From October 1, 2026 through September 30, 2027 it is FY2027. The list near the top of this page marks today's fiscal year.
When does FY2027 start and end? It starts October 1, 2026 and ends September 30, 2027.
When does FY2028 start? October 1, 2027. Congress will begin writing the FY2028 bills in the spring of 2027.
What does FY27 mean? Fiscal year 2027. FY26 is fiscal year 2026, which runs October 1, 2025 through September 30, 2026.
Why is it called 2027 if it starts in 2026? Federal fiscal years are named for the calendar year in which they end, and nine of FY2027's twelve months fall in 2027.
Is the appropriations year the same as the fiscal year? Yes. Each regular appropriations bill funds the government for one fiscal year, and the year in the bill's name is the fiscal year.
Why does the federal fiscal year start in October? The Congressional Budget Act of 1974 moved the start from July 1 to October 1 to give Congress more time to pass its spending bills. The change took effect with fiscal year 1977.
For the full path a spending bill takes, from the President's request to a signed law, see how the appropriations process works.