When Is Golden Week?
Golden Week 2027 runs from Thursday, April 29 to Wednesday, May 5, with 4 public holidays inside it.
Golden Week means two different things. In Japan it is the accident of four unrelated public holidays — Shōwa Day, Constitution Memorial Day, Greenery Day and Children’s Day — falling within a week of each other at the end of April, producing the country’s longest run of consecutive days off. In China it is the opposite: a seven-day October block deliberately assembled by the State Council and paid for by turning two weekends into working days.
Also known as: GW · ゴールデンウィーク · 黄金周
The short answer
2 countries and regions in our calendar mark it. Dates and days off below cover 2025–2028.
- 2025
- Tuesday, April 29 – Tuesday, May 6
- 2026
- Wednesday, April 29 – Wednesday, May 6
- 2027
- Thursday, April 29 – Wednesday, May 5
- 2028
- Saturday, April 29 – Friday, May 5
Dates year by year
Who gets the day off
Every row is derived from that country’s official calendar on this site, so the day counts include substitute days and government bridge days exactly as gazetted.
Golden Week 2025
| Country / region | Called | Date | Days off |
|---|---|---|---|
| Japan | Golden Week (ゴールデンウィーク)Four separate statutory holidays between 29 April and 5 May, plus substitutes — the longest stretch of consecutive days off in the Japanese year. | Apr 29 – May 6 | 5days |
| China Same date, local festivalMake-up workdays ×2 | National Day Golden Week (国庆黄金周)A deliberately engineered seven-day block in October, paid for with weekend make-up workdays. | Oct 1 – 8 | 8days |
Japan
ChinaGolden Week 2026
| Country / region | Called | Date | Days off |
|---|---|---|---|
| Japan | Golden Week (ゴールデンウィーク)Four separate statutory holidays between 29 April and 5 May, plus substitutes — the longest stretch of consecutive days off in the Japanese year. | Apr 29 – May 6 | 5days |
| China Same date, local festivalMake-up workdays ×2 | National Day Golden Week (国庆黄金周)A deliberately engineered seven-day block in October, paid for with weekend make-up workdays. | Oct 1 – 7 | 7days |
Golden Week 2027
| Country / region | Called | Date | Days off |
|---|---|---|---|
| Japan | Golden Week (ゴールデンウィーク)Four separate statutory holidays between 29 April and 5 May, plus substitutes — the longest stretch of consecutive days off in the Japanese year. | Apr 29 – May 5 | 4days |
| China Same date, local festivalProvisional | National Day Golden Week (国庆黄金周)A deliberately engineered seven-day block in October, paid for with weekend make-up workdays. | October 1, 2027 | 1days |
Rows marked provisional show only the dates already fixed. Where a government sets the length of the break by annual decree — mainland China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Indonesia — the full arrangement has not been published for that year yet, so treat those day counts as a floor and any blank as "not announced", not as a working day.
Golden Week 2028
| Country / region | Called | Date | Days off |
|---|---|---|---|
| Japan | Golden Week (ゴールデンウィーク)Four separate statutory holidays between 29 April and 5 May, plus substitutes — the longest stretch of consecutive days off in the Japanese year. | Apr 29 – May 5 | 4days |
| China Same date, local festivalProvisional | National Day Golden Week (国庆黄金周)A deliberately engineered seven-day block in October, paid for with weekend make-up workdays. | Oct 1 – 3 | 3days |
Rows marked provisional show only the dates already fixed. Where a government sets the length of the break by annual decree — mainland China, Taiwan, Vietnam, Indonesia — the full arrangement has not been published for that year yet, so treat those day counts as a floor and any blank as "not announced", not as a working day.
Japan: an accident of the calendar, kept on purpose
The four holidays were not designed as a block. Shōwa Day on 29 April was the Emperor’s Birthday until 1989; Constitution Memorial Day, Greenery Day and Children’s Day sit on 3, 4 and 5 May. Because Japanese law makes a weekday sandwiched between two holidays a holiday itself, and grants a substitute Monday when a holiday falls on a Sunday, the cluster reliably produces four to six consecutive days off, and often more once annual leave is added.
The practical consequence is that domestic travel prices roughly double, shinkansen reservations open exactly a month ahead and sell out within hours, and most companies shut entirely. Booking anything inside Golden Week on short notice is close to impossible.
China: a week built by decree
China’s National Day Golden Week starts on 1 October and runs about seven days. Only three of those are statutory; the rest are borrowed from the adjacent weekends and repaid as make-up workdays before or after. The system was introduced in 1999 explicitly to stimulate domestic tourism, and it works — it is the single busiest travel week on earth.
Mainland China also runs a Spring Festival golden week in January or February, which is longer still. Our Chinese New Year page covers that one in detail.
Planning around Golden Week
Both weeks are hard stops for business. Japanese offices are unreachable for the duration and email backlogs clear slowly afterwards; Chinese factories, customs offices and banks close for the October block and reopen at reduced pace. If you need something signed, dated or shipped, work around the ranges in the table rather than through them.
Go deeper
Frequently asked questions
What are the Golden Week dates in Japan for 2026 and 2027?+
Golden Week always spans 29 April to 5 or 6 May. The exact days off depend on which weekday each holiday lands on and whether a substitute Monday is triggered — the year-by-year table above shows the published dates for each year.
Which holidays make up Japan’s Golden Week?+
Shōwa Day (29 April), Constitution Memorial Day (3 May), Greenery Day (4 May) and Children’s Day (5 May), plus any substitute holiday and any weekday sandwiched between two of them.
Is Golden Week the same in Japan and China?+
No. They share a nickname, not a date or a mechanism. Japan’s falls at the end of April and emerges from four pre-existing holidays; China’s falls in October and is assembled by decree, with weekend make-up workdays as the price.
How long is China’s Golden Week?+
Usually seven consecutive days from 1 October, occasionally eight when it merges with the Mid-Autumn Festival. Two nearby weekends are converted into make-up workdays to fund it.
Should I avoid travelling during Golden Week?+
If you can, yes. Prices peak, transport sells out weeks ahead and major sites are at capacity. The week immediately after Golden Week is usually the cheapest and quietest window of the spring in Japan.