An effective approach for a user equipment (UE) to perform a sidelink communication with another UE in a discontinuous reception (DRX) mode is disclosed. For example, a UE may determine a direct frame number (DFN) timing, and configure a sidelink DRX mode using one or more sidelink DRX parameters based on the DFN timing. The UE may perform a sidelink communication with a second UE during an on-duration of a sidelink DRX cycle in the sidelink DRX mode according to the one or more sidelink DRX parameters.