Saxony, Germany public holidays 2026

2026 at a glance

• German Unity Day falls on Saturday 3 October and is not moved; Reformation Day falls on Saturday 31 October and is not moved; Second Day of Christmas falls on Saturday 26 December and is not moved, because Germany has no statutory substitute days.
• In 2026, public holidays fall on 8 weekdays in Saxony, three fewer than in 2025.

Germany has no statutory substitute days: a public holiday that falls on a Saturday or Sunday is not moved to a weekday, so the following Monday stays a working day in these counts. Each German state sets its own public holidays on top of the nine that apply everywhere. Corpus Christi is a public holiday only in some municipalities with a Catholic tradition; it is listed but not counted.

Public holidays in 2026

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

• not counted some employers only

Also observed by some

1 more day is a holiday only for some employers, sectors or areas in 2026. It is not counted as a non-working day here.

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 18 working days in May, 3 holidays
• Jun 22 working days in June
• Jul 23 working days in July
• Aug 21 working days in August
• Sep 22 working days in September
• Oct 22 working days in October, 2 holidays
• Nov 20 working days in November, 1 holiday
• Dec 22 working days in December, 2 holidays

Compare with the rest of Germany

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 Friday 1 May 2026 to Sunday 3 May 2026
• 3 days Saturday 23 May 2026 to Monday 25 May 2026
• 3 days Friday 25 December 2026 to Sunday 27 December 2026

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 Saxony

Saxony is the only German state where Repentance and Prayer Day, the Buß- und Bettag, is still a public holiday. It falls on the Wednesday before 23 November, which is 17 November in 2027. Every other state dropped it in the mid-1990s, when the national care insurance scheme was introduced, to offset the employers' new contributions. Saxony kept the day, and federal care insurance law draws the consequence: where a state did not give up a holiday that always fell on a weekday, employees pay a larger share of the contribution themselves. For someone choosing where to base a job, this is a genuine difference between neighbouring states.

The state's act on Sundays and public holidays lists the other days in its first section: New Year's Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, 1 May, Ascension Day, Whit Monday, German Unity Day, Reformation Day on 31 October, and the two Christmas days. That gives eleven days with Repentance Day, and every one of them applies across the state. The act gives no date for Repentance Day, which is why it is calculated from the Wednesday before 23 November.

Corpus Christi is the exception that needs care. The act makes it a statutory holiday only in the regions that the interior ministry names by ordinance. Those regions are a small number of municipalities with a Catholic tradition; everywhere else in Saxony it is only a religious observance. This site lists it under days observed by some, marked as applying in some Catholic municipalities only, and does not count it. If you work in one of the named towns, you have one more day off than the figures show.

Saxony shares Reformation Day with Thuringia, Saxony-Anhalt, Brandenburg and Mecklenburg-Vorpommern, so within the east the main distinctions are small: Saxony-Anhalt adds Epiphany, Thuringia adds World Children's Day, and Saxony adds Repentance Day. It has no Epiphany, All Saints' Day or Assumption, unlike the Catholic south and west.

If a holiday falls on a Saturday or Sunday, Saxon law does not shift it and no replacement is owed. Reformation Day is a Sunday in 2027. Easter Sunday and Whit Sunday sit on Sundays by definition, and Christmas Eve and New Year's Eve are normal working days in law; none of these changes the count here.

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://revosax.sachsen.de/vorschrift_gesamt/3997/48138.html
• https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/sgb_11/__58.html
• https://www.landesrecht.sachsen-anhalt.de/bsst/document/jlr-NNLST0000411CNN00000000003
• https://landesrecht.thueringen.de/bsth/document/jlr-NNLTH00003E03NN00000000006

How the counts are made