What are the federal holidays?

The federal holidays are the 11 legal public holidays listed in 5 U.S.C. 6103: New Year's Day, the Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., Washington's Birthday, Memorial Day, Juneteenth National Independence Day, Independence Day, Labor Day, Columbus Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving Day and Christmas Day. The U.S. Office of Personnel Management says on its federal holidays page that this law establishes the public holidays for federal employees.

The 11 federal holidays and how the law sets each date

The law gives five holidays a fixed calendar date, sets five to a Monday and sets Thanksgiving Day to a Thursday.

Federal holiday dates in 2026 and 2027

The Office of Personnel Management publishes the day each holiday is observed, and its schedule gives these dates for 2026 and 2027.

Four dates in the table differ from the date in the law: Independence Day in 2026, and Juneteenth National Independence Day, Independence Day and Christmas Day in 2027. The schedule marks each of them with its note on holidays that fall on a weekend, which the next section explains. A separate page covers when Thanksgiving is in 2026.

What happens when a holiday falls on a weekend

The Office of Personnel Management says most federal employees work a Monday through Friday schedule. For those employees, a holiday that falls on a Saturday is treated as a holiday on the Friday before for pay and leave purposes, and a holiday that falls on a Sunday is treated as a holiday on the Monday after. The agency cites 5 U.S.C. 6103(b) for the Saturday rule and Section 3(a) of Executive Order 11582, dated February 11, 1971, for the Sunday rule.

Why the list says Washington's Birthday

The holiday on the third Monday in February is named Washington's Birthday in the law. The Office of Personnel Management notes that state and local governments and private businesses may use other names, and it says of its own practice, "it is our policy to always refer to holidays by the names designated in the law."

Inauguration Day

The same section of the law makes Inauguration Day, January 20 of each fourth year after 1965, a legal public holiday for federal employees who work in the District of Columbia, in Montgomery and Prince Georges Counties in Maryland, in Arlington and Fairfax Counties in Virginia, and in the cities of Alexandria and Falls Church in Virginia. The Office of Personnel Management's 2025 schedule lists it on Monday, January 20, 2025, and its 2026 and 2027 schedules do not list it.