According to an embodiment of the invention, a system and method to provide alignment of hibernation and active cycles is provided. When one device receives a beacon from one of its neighbors it can be implemented to check for the neighboring device's global cycle start countdown value and to compare it's global cycle start countdown value with its own. If the beacon from the neighboring device contains a global cycle start countdown value that is different from the device's own global cycle start countdown, the device can be implemented to check a predefined condition. For example, if a device's global cycle start time falls into the first half of a neighbor's global cycle, then the device changes its own global cycle start time to the global cycle start time of that neighbor. In another embodiment, if a device's global cycle start time falls into the first 256/K superframes of a neighbor's global cycle, then the device changes its own global cycle start time to the global cycle start time of that neighbor. In one embodiment, K can be the number of different global active cycle start times observed by the device.