You can’t get an exact answer for “how late the closest grocery store is open” in 2020 without checking a live map or store site, but you can use a simple process to find accurate hours near you, even with old (pandemic-era) schedules in mind.

Key point for 2020

In 2020, many grocery stores shortened hours because of COVID‑19 cleaning, staffing, and special “senior” shopping times. Even chains that were normally 24 hours (like some big-box or supermarket brands) often shifted to closing around 8–10 p.m., then gradually extended again later. Because each location changed policies at different times, you always had to check that specific store’s hours, not just rely on “24 hours” signs.

How to find the closest store and its hours

Use this same method today if you want to know how late your nearest store is/was open:

  1. Open Google Maps or Apple Maps.
  2. Type “grocery store” or the exact chain name.
  3. Tap the closest result.
  4. Scroll to the “Hours” or “Open ⋯” line to see today’s closing time and any special notes for holidays or exceptions.
  1. Use “Open now” or similar filters so you only see places that are currently open.

Many store chains (Walmart, Kroger, Whole Foods, Wegmans, etc.) also have “Find a store” pages where you enter your zip code, then click a location to see its daily hours. That’s often the most reliable way to see if a location ever stayed open late or 24 hours.

Typical closing times you might see

These aren’t guarantees for your exact store, but they give you a rough idea of what was common and what you might still see now:

  • Big-box supermarkets (like many supercenters): often 10 p.m.–midnight, though some locations close earlier or open later.
  • Standard neighborhood grocery stores: very often 9–10 p.m., sometimes 8 p.m. in smaller towns or during stricter COVID periods.
  • Small local markets: frequently 7–9 p.m., with shorter Sunday or holiday hours.
  • Formerly 24‑hour stores: many cut overnight hours after 2020 and now close around midnight or earlier, even if they used to be 24/7.

So unless your nearest store advertises 24 hours, it’s safest to assume it closes somewhere between 9 p.m. and midnight and to double‑check the exact store listing for that date.

If you’re asking for nostalgia (specifically “2020”)

If your question is more like a trending/Reddit‑style topic (“remember when everything closed early in 2020?”), the short version is:

In 2020, “how late is the closest grocery store open?” suddenly mattered a lot, because many places that used to run late or all night started closing as early as 7–9 p.m. for cleaning, restocking, and reduced staffing, and people had to plan trips around those reduced hours.

Online delivery apps and grocery websites became a fallback for late‑night needs, since you could order anytime even if physical stores weren’t open.

TL;DR: There’s no single fixed answer for 2020 or now; to know how late your closest grocery store is open, you have to look up that specific location on maps or the chain’s store‑finder and check its daily hours, especially because COVID changed schedules a lot.

Information gathered from public forums or data available on the internet and portrayed here.