UK and Ireland Bank Holidays 2026 and 2027: An Employer's Guide

Why Every HR Professional Needs This Bank Holiday Breakdown

Bank holidays look simple. Everyone gets the day off, and business resumes the next morning. But if you've been in HR for more than five minutes, you'll know it's never that simple. Leave requests cluster around them, regional calendars don't line up, and the odd year throws in a weekend Christmas that changes everything.

2027 is one of those years. Easter is early (late March), and both Christmas Day and Boxing Day land on a weekend, so the UK gets substitute days while Ireland doesn't. Whether you're managing a team in Manchester, coordinating offices in Belfast and Dublin, or explaining to American colleagues why everything stops for Easter Monday, this guide gives you every date and the planning points that go with them.

Want the dates in your own calendar? Our free UK bank holidays 2027 and Ireland public holidays 2027 pages list every date, and you can subscribe so they appear automatically in Outlook or Google Calendar.

Bank Holidays 2027: Every Date by Region

England and Wales (8 bank holidays)

Scotland (9 bank holidays)

Scotland adds 2 January and St Andrew's Day, moves the summer bank holiday to the first Monday in August, and doesn't have Easter Monday as a bank holiday.

Many Scottish towns and cities also have their own local holidays, and lots of Scottish employers observe Easter Monday anyway, so check what your contracts actually say.

Northern Ireland (10 bank holidays)

Northern Ireland follows the England and Wales calendar and adds two more:

Republic of Ireland (10 public holidays)

Good Friday isn't a public holiday in Ireland, although many businesses close. St Brigid's Day, added in 2023, falls on 1 February when that's a Friday, and otherwise on the first Monday in February.

Still to Come in 2026

If you're reading this before the end of 2026, there are a few dates left this year:

• Scotland: St Andrew's Day, Monday 30 November
• Whole UK: Christmas Day, Friday 25 December, and Boxing Day (substitute day), Monday 28 December
• Ireland: Christmas Day, Friday 25 December, and St Stephen's Day, Saturday 26 December

The Weekend Christmas Problem: UK vs Ireland

Here's the detail that catches multi-country employers out. In the UK, when a bank holiday falls on a weekend, a substitute weekday is given, so in 2027 the UK gets Monday 27 and Tuesday 28 December off.

Ireland works differently. There's no automatic substitute day. Instead, under the Organisation of Working Time Act, employees who qualify are entitled to one of the following, chosen by the employer: a paid day off within a month, an extra day of annual leave, or an extra day's pay. In practice many Irish employers simply close on 27 and 28 December, but you need to decide and tell people early. If your Dublin team assumes they get the same days as your London team, you'll have an awkward conversation in December.

Bank Holidays and Holiday Entitlement: The Rules

In the UK, the statutory minimum is 5.6 weeks' paid holiday a year (28 days for someone working five days a week), and employers can include bank holidays in that. There's no legal right to have bank holidays off, or to extra pay for working them; it all comes down to the contract. If you're unsure what someone is entitled to, our holiday entitlement calculator works it out for full-time, part-time and irregular-hours workers.

In Ireland, public holidays are separate from annual leave. Employees get their statutory annual leave (four working weeks for most full-time staff) plus a benefit for each of the 10 public holidays.

Don't Forget Part-Timers

Most bank holidays fall on a Monday, which is great for your Monday-to-Friday staff and less great for someone who works Wednesdays to Fridays. To avoid treating part-timers less favourably, the safest approach is to give everyone a pro-rata share of bank holiday entitlement, rather than only giving people the bank holidays that happen to land on their working days. Acas guidance covers this in more detail.

Strategic Workforce Planning: The Art of Holiday Juggling

Managing leave around bank holidays isn't just about approving requests. It's about keeping the business running while keeping people happy, and those two goals collide at the same few points every year.

Easter 2027: The Early-Spring Rush

With Good Friday on 26 March and Easter Monday on 29 March, the classic move is to book Tuesday 30 March to Friday 2 April. That's four days of annual leave for ten days off in a row. Brilliant for the employee; a headache for you if half the team has the same idea. Because Easter is so early, those requests will start arriving in January, so decide now how you'll handle them.

May: Two Long Weekends

The early May and spring bank holidays (3 and 31 May) both create long weekends, and the half-term week around the late May bank holiday is popular with parents. Expect clashes in that last week of May.

Christmas 2027: Ten Days Off for Three

Christmas 2027 is generous in the UK. With substitute days on 27 and 28 December and the New Year's Day substitute on Monday 3 January 2028, booking just Wednesday 29 to Friday 31 December gives ten consecutive days off. You can expect a lot of people to spot that, so many organisations simply close for the week. If you can't close, set out a clear rota or first-come-first-served rule early.

The Multi-Regional Challenge

If you manage teams across regions, you're juggling several calendars at once. Your Dublin office is closed for St Brigid's Day while London works as normal, your Belfast colleagues are off for the Twelfth while everyone else is in, and your Edinburgh team has a different summer bank holiday to everyone else.

The fix is visibility. Your leave management system should let each person follow the right regional calendar, so managers can see at a glance who's actually available on any given day.

Policy Considerations: Getting Your House in Order

Many annual leave policies were written years ago for a single office. A quick review before the new holiday year pays off:

Be explicit about bank holidays: Say whether bank holidays are included in or on top of annual leave, how part-timers are treated, and what happens if someone works one.

Floating holidays: Some organisations let employees swap a bank holiday for a day that matters more to them, such as a religious or cultural festival. It's a low-cost way to be inclusive.

Rules for busy periods: Whether it's first-come-first-served, a rota, or a cap on how many people can be off at once, write it down. Transparency prevents disputes.

Christmas closure: If you close between Christmas and New Year, say so early and explain whether those days come out of annual leave. In the UK you must give notice of at least twice the length of the leave you're requiring people to take.

Managing Employee Expectations

The simplest win is communication. Share the bank holiday calendar at the start of the year, flag the pressure points (Easter, late May, Christmas), and explain how requests will be decided. People plan more sensibly when they understand the constraints, and they accept a "no" more gracefully when the rules are clear and applied fairly.

Remember that you're managing relationships, not just dates. The person who got their first choice for Easter will usually be more understanding if their summer request has to move.

Making 2027 Work for Everyone

The bank holiday calendar is fixed, but how you manage around it is entirely up to you. Get the dates in front of people early, decide your rules for the busy periods before the requests arrive, and use a system that shows who's off across every region.

Good holiday management isn't about saying no. It's about building a process that lets you say yes as often as possible while the work still gets done. And don't forget to book some time off yourself; HR people need a break too.