The Act that governs Japanese public holidays names 16 of them, but the Cabinet Office calendar for 2026 prints 18 days, and the calendar for 2027 prints 17. The difference is not a rounding error or a regional variation: two clauses of the same Act manufacture extra days out of the way the 16 fall in a given year, and 2026 happens to trigger both of them.
Article 2 of Act No. 178 of 1948 lists the 16, and Article 3 adds 6 May and 22 September
The governing law is the Act on National Holidays, Act No. 178 of 1948. Article 2 lists the 16. Article 3 makes them days off and then adds the two clauses that do the extra work. In 2026 the Cabinet Office table carries 18 rows: the 16, plus 6 May under Article 3, paragraph 2, and 22 September under Article 3, paragraph 3.
| 2026 date | How the date is set |
|---|---|
| 1 January | Fixed date in the Act |
| 12 January | Second Monday of January |
| 11 February | Cabinet Order |
| 23 February | Fixed date in the Act |
| 20 March | Vernal equinox day |
| 29 April | Fixed date in the Act |
| 3 May | Fixed date in the Act |
| 4 May | Fixed date in the Act |
| 5 May | Fixed date in the Act |
| 6 May | Article 3, paragraph 2 |
| 20 July | Third Monday of July |
| 11 August | Fixed date in the Act |
| 21 September | Third Monday of September |
| 22 September | Article 3, paragraph 3 |
| 23 September | Autumnal equinox day |
| 12 October | Second Monday of October |
| 3 November | Fixed date in the Act |
| 23 November | Fixed date in the Act |
The 2027 table on the same page has 17 rows: the 16, plus 22 March under Article 3, paragraph 2. Nothing in 2027 triggers paragraph 3.
Nine of the 16 carry a fixed date, four fall on an ordinal Monday, and two follow the sun
Read Article 2 as a list of date rules rather than a list of names and it splits four ways.
| How the Act sets the date | Holidays | The rules themselves |
|---|---|---|
| A calendar date written into the Act | 9 | 1 January, 23 February, 29 April, 3 May, 4 May, 5 May, 11 August, 3 November, 23 November |
| An ordinal Monday | 4 | Second Monday of January, third Monday of July, third Monday of September, second Monday of October |
| An astronomical event | 2 | Vernal equinox day, autumnal equinox day |
| A Cabinet Order | 1 | Cabinet Order No. 376 of 1966 sets it at 11 February |
The four ordinal Mondays are the reason a Japanese calendar cannot be reused from one year to the next, and the reason the September cluster moves. The third Monday of September can be any date from 15 to 21 September; the autumnal equinox day can be 22, 23 or 24 September. When the Monday lands on the 21st and the equinox on the 23rd, the 22nd is trapped between two holidays, and Article 3, paragraph 3 turns it into one. That is exactly what happens in 2026.
The Official Gazette of 1 February fixes the equinox dates for the following year, and the Cabinet Office page stops at 2027
Article 2 does not give a date for the two equinox holidays. It names the vernal equinox day and the autumnal equinox day, which are astronomical terms: the instant the sun crosses the intersection of the ecliptic and the celestial equator, and the day that contains that instant.
The National Astronomical Observatory of Japan sets out the procedure. The date becomes official when the observatory’s calendar report is carried in the Official Gazette on 1 February of the preceding year, so the Gazette of 1 February 2021 carried the equinox dates for 2022. Before that publication, the observatory states, the date is not yet formally decided. There is a clause inside the clause: the Gazette is not issued on days when administrative organs are closed, so if 1 February falls on such a day the report appears on a later day instead.
Reading the two pages together, the Cabinet Office page carries 2026 and 2027 and stops there. It says in terms that the 2028 holidays will be posted in February of 2027. Anyone planning a trip more than two years ahead is working from a forecast, not from a published calendar.
In the 31 years to 2050 the autumnal equinox never falls on the date it fell on in 1955
The observatory publishes that forecast, for 2020 to 2050 inclusive, and warns that the motion of the earth changes and that observation may not match the calculation. Counting its 31 rows gives a narrow spread, and the count is mine.
- The vernal equinox day falls on 20 March in 23 of the 31 years and on 21 March in the other 8.
- The autumnal equinox day falls on 23 September in 21 of the 31 years and on 22 September in the other 10.
Set that against the Cabinet Office’s own list of holidays since 1955, which is published as a spreadsheet file. Its first year, 1955, records the autumnal equinox holiday on 24 September. No year in the 31-year forecast reaches 24 September at all. The date is available to the rule and simply does not come up in that window.
Two clauses of Article 3 create the extra days, and 2026 uses both
Paragraph 2 is the simpler clause: when a holiday falls on a Sunday, the nearest following day that is not itself a holiday becomes a day off. Paragraph 3 is the one that catches people out: a day that is not a holiday but has a holiday on both the day before and the day after is itself a day off. The Cabinet Office illustrates the second with September 2015, when the third Monday fell on the 21st and the equinox on the 23rd, leaving the 22nd in between.
The spreadsheet shows how often this happens. It runs from 1 January 1955 to 23 November 2027 and holds 1,067 dated rows under 23 different names. Of those rows, 116 carry the name used for a day created by one of the two clauses rather than by Article 2. Those counts are mine, taken from the file as published.
The clauses also explain a common confusion about consecutive days off. The run in early May is not one holiday but four separate entries in Article 2, at 29 April and at 3, 4 and 5 May, with 30 April, 1 and 2 May as ordinary days in between. The 2026 substitution shows how far the rule can push a day. Reading the calendar, 3 May 2026 falls on a Sunday, and 4 and 5 May are themselves holidays, so neither can serve as the substitute; the Act sends the day off to the nearest following day that is not a holiday, which is the 6th. The reading of the weekday is mine; what the Cabinet Office prints is the result, 6 May, under paragraph 2. The 2027 table does the same thing with less distance, adding 22 March after the equinox holiday on the 21st.
Government offices close for six days at New Year, and 1 January is the only holiday among them
A separate Act does the work that the Holidays Act does not. The Act on Holidays of Administrative Organs, Act No. 91 of 1988, lists in Article 1 the days on which, as a general rule, administrative organs do not conduct business: Sundays and Saturdays; the days that are holidays under the Holidays Act; and 29 December to 3 January, excluding from that run any day the preceding item has already made a holiday.
So the New Year closure of government offices is six calendar days, 29 December to 3 January, and 1 January is the only one of the six that the Holidays Act makes a national holiday. Article 2 of the same Act adds a practical consequence: where a law or an order based on a law sets a deadline for an application or a notification to a national administrative agency, and that deadline falls on one of these closed days, the deadline is treated as the following day, unless that law or order provides otherwise.
The same Act is what makes the equinox publication rule circular. The Gazette is not issued on days when administrative organs are closed, and whether they are closed is decided by this Act, which in turn defers to the Holidays Act, which cannot name the equinox dates without the Gazette.
The list has grown from nine days in 1955, and four one-off days sit inside it
The 1955 rows in the Cabinet Office file number nine. The holiday now set by Cabinet Order at 11 February is not among them; the Cabinet Order dates from 1966. The October holiday first appears in the file on 10 October 1966 and last appears under that name on 8 October 2018. The August holiday first appears on 11 August 2016. The present October holiday appears under its current name from 24 July 2020, which is one of the dates moved for the Tokyo Games.
Those moves are set out on the Cabinet Office page as a special measure limited to two years. In 2020 the July holiday went to the 23rd, the October holiday to the 24th and the August holiday to the 10th. In 2021 they went to 22 July, 23 July and 8 August, and the Sunday rule then added 9 August as a day off.
Four rows in the file are not holidays under Article 2 at all. They are single dates created for a single occasion: 10 April 1959, 24 February 1989, 12 November 1990 and 9 June 1993. Two further rows, 1 May and 22 October 2019, are recorded under a name that marks them as treated as holidays, and 14 October 2019 carries a transitional name for the October holiday. Together with the 116 rows produced by Article 3, and the former name under which the file carries the October holiday down to 2018, those are the reasons the file holds 23 names for a law that lists 16.
For travel planning, the count that matters is the 18 days in 2026 and the 17 in 2027, not the 16 in the Act. If the dates matter for booking a long-distance train, see also the 53 days on which the Nozomi runs with every seat reserved.
Sources Checked
Cabinet Office — on the National Holidays
Confirmed that the Act on National Holidays is Act No. 178 of 1948 and sets 16 holidays in a year; the text of Article 2 with the date rule for each of the 16, and of Article 3 with its three paragraphs; that Cabinet Order No. 376 of 1966 sets the February holiday at 11 February; the full 2026 table of 18 rows including 6 May under Article 3 paragraph 2 and 22 September under Article 3 paragraph 3; the 2027 table of 17 rows including 22 March under Article 3 paragraph 2; the statement that the 2028 holidays will be posted in February of the preceding year; the September 2015 example of a day falling between two holidays; and the 2020 and 2021 movements of the July, August and October holidays under the special measure for the Tokyo Games, including 9 August 2021 becoming a day off under Article 3 paragraph 2.
https://www8.cao.go.jp/chosei/shukujitsu/gaiyou.html
Cabinet Office — list of national holidays and days off, 1955 to 2027, in spreadsheet form
Confirmed that the file runs from 1 January 1955 to 23 November 2027; that it holds 1,067 dated rows under 23 different names; that 116 rows carry the name used for a day created under Article 3; that 1955 has nine rows and that its autumnal equinox row is 24 September; that 2024 has 21 rows, 2025 has 19, 2026 has 18 and 2027 has 17; that the October holiday under its former name runs from 10 October 1966 to 8 October 2018; that the August holiday first appears on 11 August 2016 and the October holiday under its present name on 24 July 2020; and that the file contains single-occasion rows dated 10 April 1959, 24 February 1989, 12 November 1990 and 9 June 1993, together with 1 May and 22 October 2019 and a transitional row for 14 October 2019. The counts of rows, names and years are my own, taken from the file as published.
https://www8.cao.go.jp/chosei/shukujitsu/syukujitsu.csv
National Astronomical Observatory of Japan — frequently asked questions, question 3-1
Confirmed that the equinox dates become official when the observatory’s calendar report is carried in the Official Gazette on 1 February of the preceding year, with the example of the Gazette of 1 February 2021 carrying the 2022 dates; that the dates are not formally decided before that; that the Gazette is not issued on days when administrative organs are closed, so publication moves to a later day when 1 February is such a day; the definition of the vernal and autumnal equinox days by the crossing of the ecliptic and the celestial equator; and the forecast table for 2020 to 2050, from which the counts of 23 and 8 for March and 21 and 10 for September are my own.
https://www.nao.ac.jp/faq/a0301.html
e-Gov — Act on Holidays of Administrative Organs, Act No. 91 of 1988
Confirmed the text of Article 1, which lists Sundays and Saturdays, the days made holidays by the Act on National Holidays, and 29 December to 3 January excluding the days listed in the preceding item; the definition of administrative organs in Article 1, paragraph 2; and Article 2, which treats a statutory deadline falling on such a day as falling on the following day unless the law or order provides otherwise.
https://laws.e-gov.go.jp/law/363AC0000000091
Last updated: September 2026
