Geneva, Switzerland public holidays 2026

2026 at a glance

• National Day falls on Saturday 1 August and is not moved, because Switzerland has no statutory substitute days.
• In 2026, public holidays fall on 8 weekdays in Geneva, one fewer than in 2025.

Switzerland has no statutory substitute days: a public holiday that falls on a Saturday or Sunday is not moved to a weekday. Only 1 August is a federal holiday; each canton's law makes some other days equal to a Sunday, and these counts include exactly those. Further cantonal rest days, days kept only in some areas and days that many employers give off by custom are listed but not counted.

Public holidays in 2026

9 dates are counted as non-working in Geneva in 2026; 8 of them fall on a weekday.

Working days and hours by month

Working days are Monday to Friday minus the counted holidays. Hours are shown for a 7.5-hour and an 8-hour working day.

• Jan 21 working days in January, 1 holiday
• Feb 20 working days in February
• Mar 22 working days in March
• Apr 20 working days in April, 2 holidays
• May 19 working days in May, 2 holidays
• Jun 22 working days in June
• Jul 23 working days in July
• Aug 21 working days in August, 1 holiday
• Sep 21 working days in September, 1 holiday
• Oct 22 working days in October
• Nov 21 working days in November
• Dec 21 working days in December, 2 holidays

Compare with the rest of Switzerland

Long weekends in 2026

Runs of three or more days off in a row without taking leave.

• 4 days Friday 3 April 2026 to Monday 6 April 2026
• 3 days Saturday 23 May 2026 to Monday 25 May 2026
• 3 days Friday 25 December 2026 to Sunday 27 December 2026
• 4 days Thursday 31 December 2026 to Sunday 3 January 2027

Best days to take leave in 2026

The longest single break for each number of leave days, built around a public holiday.

Leave plans for the whole year

Non-overlapping breaks that give the most days off for a given number of leave days.

Try any budget from 1 to 30 days in the leave planner

Countdown

The days to the next holiday appear here when JavaScript is on.

The working days left this month and this year appear here when JavaScript is on.

Count working days between two dates

Calendar and data downloads

The subscription works in Google Calendar, Outlook and Apple Calendar. The CSV file also lists the days observed by some.

About public holidays in Geneva

Geneva keeps a calendar that no other canton shares in full, because two of its holidays are local inventions. The Geneva Act on public holidays (RSG J 1 45) names the Jeûne genevois and 31 December, the anniversary of the restoration of the Republic, alongside the usual religious and national days. The cantonal website lists the official holidays for each year and gives the rules for the two Geneva dates.

The Jeûne genevois, the Geneva Fast, is held on the Thursday following the first Sunday of September; in 2026 the canton gives Thursday 10 September. It descends from a Calvinist day of fasting and prayer and is not the same as the Federal Fast, which falls on a Sunday and gives no extra day off. The Restauration de la République commemorates the return of Geneva's independence at the end of 1813 and is held on 31 December whatever the weekday; in 2026 that is a Thursday.

Here is what this page counts. Under Article 20a of the federal Labour Act, a canton may equate certain days with Sundays, and for Geneva the SECO table lists nine of them: New Year's Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, Ascension Day, Whit Monday, 1 August, the Jeûne genevois, Christmas Day and the Restauration. Those nine are the holidays totalled here. Counting only the ones that fall on a Monday to Friday, 2026 has 253 working days and 2027 has 254.

What stays outside the count is a short list. 2 January, 1 May and 26 December do not appear among Geneva's equated days, so the day after Christmas is not counted here, unlike in Bern or Basel. The Escalade, the early-December festival that commemorates the failed Savoyard attack of 1602, is a major civic celebration but is not an official holiday.

The Jeûne genevois always falls on a Thursday, so it often invites a bridge day on the Friday. If one of Geneva's fixed days falls on a Saturday or Sunday, nothing replaces it. Municipal events and half days are not counted, and payment for a holiday on a working day depends on the employment contract.

Source and last check

Dates are calculated with the python-holidays library 0.108 and checked against the official sources below. Last checked: 15 November 2026.

Sources

• https://www.ge.ch/vacances-scolaires-jours-feries/jours-feries-officiels-2022-2027
• https://silgeneve.ch/legis/data/rsg_j1_45.htm
• https://www.seco.admin.ch/dam/de/sd-web/x5LtHPJdNis5/Anhang-Feiertage-Schweiz-Auszug-ArG-ArGV1-5-SECO-SB-2024-DE.pdf

How the counts are made