What time does the 2021 Tokyo Summer Olympics Opening Ceremony start

The 2021 Summer Olympics are officially underway in Tokyo, Japan. The first events began Wednesday morning in Tokyo with women’s soccer and softball getting things started. But Friday, the Olympics “officially” open with the Opening Ceremony.

This year’s Opening Ceremony will be a little different for the American viewing audience. Tokyo is 13 hours later than Eastern Time in the United States. That means the early evening Opening Ceremony in Tokyo will be happening live at breakfast time in the US. Normally, NBC will handle that kind of time difference by simply airing the Opening Ceremony on tape delay across the US. That is not the case this year.

For the first time, NBC will offer a live broadcast of the Ceremony in the morning when it is live. The Opening Ceremony gets started at 7:55 p.m. in Tokyo, which is 6:55 a.m. ET in the US. NBC will go live at 6:55 a.m. and run live until 11 a.m. Savannah Guthrie and the network’s TODAY show crew will lead the live coverage. NBC will then offer a primetime version of the Opening Ceremony starting at 7:30 p.m. ET. Mike Tirico will lead coverage that runs until midnight.