Germany has no unified national public holiday calendar. The number of public holidays varies from 9 (in some states) to 13 (in Bavaria), depending on your Bundesland. This matters practically for planning, employment contracts, and understanding regional differences.
The National Holidays (All States)
Nine public holidays apply in all 16 German states: Neujahr (New Year’s Day, January 1); Karfreitag (Good Friday — variable date, 2 days before Easter Sunday); Ostermontag (Easter Monday — variable, 1 day after Easter Sunday); Tag der Arbeit (Labour Day, May 1); Christi Himmelfahrt (Ascension Thursday — variable, 39 days after Easter); Pfingstmontag (Whit Monday — variable, 50 days after Easter); Tag der Deutschen Einheit (German Unity Day, October 3 — the most significant secular holiday, marking reunification in 1990); Erster Weihnachtstag (Christmas Day, December 25); and Zweiter Weihnachtstag (Boxing Day/Second Christmas Day, December 26). Of these, four are variable (tied to Easter’s date, which changes each year).
The Additional State-Specific Holidays
Bavaria (Bayern) has the most public holidays (13 total, tied with Baden-Württemberg and Saarland in some years): the additional days are Heilige Drei Könige (Epiphany, January 6), Mariä Himmelfahrt (Assumption of Mary, August 15), Allerheiligen (All Saints’ Day, November 1), and Fronleichnam (Corpus Christi — variable). These additional Catholic holidays reflect Bavaria’s predominantly Catholic character. North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate, and Saarland also have most of these Catholic holidays. The Protestant northern states (Hamburg, Bremen, Lower Saxony, Brandenburg) have the fewest additional holidays. Berlin, Hamburg, and Bremen have Reformationstag (Reformation Day, October 31) since 2018. Augsburg specifically has the Hohes Friedensfest (August 8) — a holiday existing only in the city of Augsburg, unique in Germany. The practical implication: a company operating across multiple German states must maintain state-specific holiday calendars for payroll and leave management — an HR complexity unique to Germany’s federal structure.
How German Holidays Work in Practice
On public holidays: almost all retail shops are closed (Germany has strict Ladenschlussgesetz — shop closing laws — that prohibit most retail trading on Sundays and public holidays). Restaurants, some petrol stations, and tourist-facing businesses remain open. Public transport runs on a Sunday/holiday schedule. The “Brückentag” (bridge day): when a holiday falls on a Tuesday or Thursday, the Monday or Friday between the weekend and the holiday is not automatically a day off — but many German employees and companies use vacation days to create a four-day weekend, a practice so common it has a specific term. Practical planning: the Christi Himmelfahrt/Vatertag combination (Ascension Thursday + traditional “Father’s Day” — men’s outdoor drinking groups) in late May is a significant travel weekend; German Unity Day (October 3) and Reformation Day (October 31, where applicable) create autumn long weekends — train prices and hotel rates spike accordingly.
