Public holidays in Italy 2026-2027: what closes and when to visit
Reviewed by Wanderistan editorial team · Last updated Aug 6, 2026
Italy takes its public holidays seriously enough that ignoring them costs you days. On 15 August, 25 December and 1 January a great deal of the country genuinely stops. On the rest, banks and offices close, shops are patchy, and transport drops to a Sunday timetable — which is fine if you knew, and expensive if you did not.
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There is also the ponte, the bridge. When a holiday lands on a Tuesday or a Thursday, a large share of the country takes the intervening day and turns it into a four-day weekend. Trains fill, coastal and mountain hotels sell out, and prices move — driven entirely by domestic demand, so it happens whether or not it is a month foreign visitors think of as peak.
Below is the full calendar, what each date actually means on the ground, the city-specific holidays that catch people out, and the months that work best around them.
National public holidays
| Date | Italian name | What it is | What it means on the ground |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 January | Capodanno | New Year's Day | Almost everything closed; holiday transport timetable |
| 6 January | Epifania | Epiphany | End of the festive season; many museums open, most shops closed |
| Movable Sunday | Pasqua | Easter Sunday | 5 April in 2026, 28 March in 2027. Restaurants busy and booked; sights open but crowded |
| Movable Monday | Pasquetta (Lunedì dell'Angelo) | Easter Monday | 6 April in 2026, 29 March in 2027. Traditionally a day out of town — parks, hills and coast are full |
| 25 April | Festa della Liberazione | Liberation Day | Offices, banks and many shops closed; frequent ponte |
| 1 May | Festa del Lavoro | Labour Day | Widely observed; large public concerts in some cities |
| 2 June | Festa della Repubblica | Republic Day | National holiday, with ceremonies in Rome |
| 15 August | Ferragosto | Assumption | The largest closure of the year outside Christmas; cities empty, coast and mountains full |
| 1 November | Ognissanti | All Saints' Day | Cemeteries busy, many shops closed, museums generally open |
| 8 December | Immacolata Concezione | Immaculate Conception | Start of the Christmas season; city-centre shops usually trade |
| 25 December | Natale | Christmas Day | Almost everything closed; restaurants by reservation only |
| 26 December | Santo Stefano | St Stephen's Day | A public holiday, but a much more open one — museums and restaurants widely operating |
Ferragosto and the August question
15 August is the pivot of the Italian year. It is a public holiday in its own right, but the effect spreads either side of it: independent shops, restaurants, bakeries and workshops across the cities shut for one to three weeks with a chiuso per ferie sign in the window, and the owners go where everyone else goes — the coast, the lakes, the mountains.
What stays open is the tourist infrastructure: state museums, major attractions, transport, chain retail and anything in a resort town. What closes is the ordinary city. So August is a poor month for a food-led city trip and a fine one for a coastal or Alpine one, provided you booked months ago, because Italians did.
The event calendar mirrors it exactly. City theatre and concert seasons are between programmes; the festivals are all outdoors and mostly out of town.
Local patron-saint days
Each Italian city also has one holiday of its own — its patron saint's feast. Schools, municipal offices and many shops in that city close while the rest of the country works normally, and there is usually a procession, a fair or a concert attached. It is worth checking against the dates of a city stay.
| City | Patron saint | Feast day |
|---|---|---|
| Milan | Sant'Ambrogio | 7 December |
| Rome | Santi Pietro e Paolo | 29 June |
| Florence | San Giovanni Battista | 24 June |
| Turin | San Giovanni Battista | 24 June |
| Genoa | San Giovanni Battista | 24 June |
| Naples | San Gennaro | 19 September |
| Venice | San Marco | 25 April — the same day as the national Liberation Day holiday |
| Bologna | San Petronio | 4 October |
| Palermo | Santa Rosalia | July (the Festino) |
When to go, given all of the above
| Window | What you get | What to watch |
|---|---|---|
| April to June | Warm, long days, the outdoor season starting and the indoor one still running | 25 April, 1 May and 2 June all generate ponte weekends that fill trains and hotels |
| July to August | Coast, lakes, mountains and open-air festivals at full strength | Heat in the cities, Ferragosto closures, and peak domestic prices |
| September to October | The best all-round window: full programme, mild weather, harvest and food fairs | Autumn food-fair weekends in Piedmont and Tuscany book out early |
| November to March | Cheapest and quietest, with the densest indoor cultural programme of the year | The festive weeks and Easter are the exceptions and book out nationally |
Opening-hours rules that are not holidays
- Many museums close one day a week, most often Monday — check the specific museum rather than assuming.
- Restaurants take a weekly rest day (giorno di riposo), commonly Monday or Sunday evening, and it is not always posted online.
- In smaller towns, shops often close for a long lunch and stay shut on Sunday afternoons and Monday mornings.
- Pharmacies run a duty rota — the farmacia di turno — so there is always one open, and the rota is posted in the window of the closed ones.
- On public holidays, city transport runs a Sunday service and national rail runs a reduced holiday timetable.
FAQ
- What are the public holidays in Italy?
- New Year (1 January), Epiphany (6 January), Easter Sunday and Easter Monday, Liberation Day (25 April), Labour Day (1 May), Republic Day (2 June), Ferragosto (15 August), All Saints (1 November), the Immaculate Conception (8 December), Christmas Day (25 December) and Santo Stefano (26 December). Each city adds its own patron-saint day on top.
- Is everything closed in Italy in August?
- No, but a lot is. Around 15 August many independent city businesses close for their annual break. State museums, major attractions, transport and anything in a resort town keep running — the closures hit ordinary neighbourhood shops and restaurants hardest, which is why August suits a coastal trip better than a city one.
- When is Easter in Italy in 2027?
- Sunday 28 March 2027, with Easter Monday — Pasquetta — on 29 March. Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after 21 March, so it moves each year; in 2026 it falls on 5 April.
- What is a ponte in Italy?
- A bridge. When a public holiday falls on a Tuesday or Thursday, many people take the working day in between to make a four-day weekend. Domestic travel, trains and hotels fill on those dates, so it is worth checking the day of the week a holiday lands on before booking around it.
- Are museums open on public holidays in Italy?
- Most close on 1 January and 25 December and open on the other holidays, often with reduced hours. Separately, many close one fixed day a week, most commonly Monday. Always confirm on the museum's own site rather than relying on a general rule.
- What is the best month to visit Italy?
- September and October, or late April to June. Those windows combine mild weather, a full events programme and prices below the July-to-August peak. If cost matters more than weather, November to March is cheaper and quieter still, with the strongest indoor cultural season of the year.
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