Korean Public Holidays
Every South Korean public holiday for the year — lunar holidays and substitute days included.
Subscribe or download the data
The same 2024–2049 holiday list as a calendar feed and as JSON.
https://utileno.com/en/korean-holidays/calendar.icsOpen in calendar appGoogle Calendar: Other calendars → + → From URL → paste the address. iPhone: Settings → Calendar → Accounts → Add Subscribed Calendar. Later changes arrive automatically.
One file for all years, or one per year (e.g. /data/korean-holidays/2026.json). Free to use — a link back to utileno.com is appreciated.
How to use
- Pick a year (2024–2049).
- See each holiday’s date, weekday and name, with substitute holidays marked.
- The next upcoming holiday is highlighted.
Examples
When is Chuseok this year?
Chuseok and Seollal move every year because they follow the lunar calendar. Pick the year and the exact solar dates — plus the surrounding holiday days and any substitute holiday — are listed for you.
How long is the Seollal or Chuseok break?
Both run for three days: the day before, the day itself, and the day after. The calendar lists all three rather than a single date, because the two surrounding days are holidays in their own right. When a Sunday falls inside that run, or another holiday overlaps it, one substitute day is added on the next free weekday — which is why some years give four days off and others three. Add a weekend at either end and a five-day stretch is common, which is what turns these two weeks into the busiest travel periods of the year.
What actually closes on a Korean holiday?
Government offices, banks, post offices and schools close on every holiday listed here. Hospitals keep emergency rooms open but outpatient departments usually do not run. Large retailers and convenience stores generally stay open, though many close on Seollal and Chuseok day itself. Palaces and major museums often open on holidays and take their weekly rest day instead. Small independent restaurants and shops are the least predictable: during the Seollal and Chuseok runs many close for the entire period while their owners travel.
Which of these are paid days off?
All of them, for most employees. Since 1 January 2022 the public holidays in this calendar are statutory paid holidays for every workplace with five or more employees, having been phased in from 2020 for larger companies first. Working one of these days earns holiday premium pay on top of the normal wage. Workplaces with fewer than five employees sit outside that rule, so for them a public holiday is an ordinary working day unless the employment contract or company rules say otherwise.
Stretching a holiday with annual leave
Because substitute holidays land on the next free weekday, a holiday that falls on a Tuesday or Thursday leaves a single working day stranded between the holiday and the weekend. Taking one day of annual leave there converts a one-day holiday into a four-day break, which is why those bridge days fill up first in most offices. Looking at a full year at once makes those spots easy to spot before anyone else claims them.
Is today a public holiday in Korea?
The answer sits at the top of the page and is about today specifically, not the year you happen to be browsing. If today is a holiday it names which one and marks whether it is a substitute day. This is the fastest way to check before assuming a bank, a government office or a delivery service is running.
Looking at a single month
Filtering to one month answers the question people usually arrive with — whether September has a long break, or whether April has anything at all. Several months have no public holidays, and seeing that stated plainly is more useful than scanning a full year for something that is not there.
FAQ
Which holidays does this calendar contain?
Two kinds. Fixed solar dates: New Year’s Day (1 Jan), Independence Movement Day (1 Mar), Children’s Day (5 May), Memorial Day (6 Jun), Liberation Day (15 Aug), National Foundation Day (3 Oct), Hangeul Day (9 Oct) and Christmas (25 Dec). Lunar dates, which move every year: Seollal with the day before and after (lunar 1/1 ± 1), Chuseok with the day before and after (lunar 8/15 ± 1), and Buddha’s Birthday (lunar 4/8). The lunar dates are computed from the same KASI-based table used by the lunar converter on this site.
How are substitute holidays (대체공휴일) decided?
Not uniformly — which is why the rule differs per holiday here. Independence Movement Day, Buddha’s Birthday, Liberation Day, National Foundation Day, Hangeul Day and Christmas get a substitute when they fall on a Saturday or Sunday. Children’s Day gets one when it falls on a weekend or coincides with another holiday. The Seollal and Chuseok runs get a single substitute when the three-day run contains a Sunday or overlaps another holiday. New Year’s Day and Memorial Day get no substitute at all. The substitute is placed on the next weekday that is neither a weekend nor already a holiday, so two holidays can never claim the same replacement day.
Which years are covered, and why does it start at 2024?
2024 through 2049. The substitute-holiday rules were extended in stages over recent years, so applying today’s rules to older years would produce dates that were not actually days off. Rather than mixing several historical rule sets, the calendar starts where the current rules apply throughout.
Are temporary holidays and election days included?
No. One-off temporary holidays (임시공휴일) are declared by the government for a specific date, and national election days are set per election. Neither follows a standing rule that can be computed in advance, so neither appears here. If the government designates such a day, it will be missing from this calendar.
Can these dates change?
Yes. Public holidays and the substitute rules are set by regulation, and a change to that regulation changes the answer for future years. The dates shown here reflect the rules in force at the time of writing; for years far in the future, treat them as the expected result of today’s rules rather than a guarantee.
Is a public holiday the same as a statutory holiday?
They overlap now, but they started as different things. The list here comes from the regulation on public holidays for government offices (관공서의 공휴일에 관한 규정), which originally bound only the public sector. Private employers were brought under it in stages — companies with 300 or more employees from 2020, 30 to 299 from 2021, and 5 to 29 from 2022 — so for workplaces of five or more these are now statutory paid holidays under the Labor Standards Act. Separately, every employee who works a full week also earns a weekly paid rest day (주휴일), which is usually Sunday and is not part of this calendar.
Why do some years have more days off than others?
Because the fixed-date holidays drift across the week. In a year where Independence Movement Day, Liberation Day and Christmas all land midweek, each one is a clean day off. In a year where several fall on a Saturday, some produce a substitute and some do not, depending on the per-holiday rule. New Year’s Day and Memorial Day never generate a substitute, so a year that puts both on a weekend simply loses them. Comparing two years side by side in this calendar shows the swing clearly — it is normally two to three days.
Do Seollal and Chuseok always fall in the same months?
Roughly, but not exactly. Seollal is lunar 1/1, which lands somewhere between late January and mid-February on the solar calendar. Chuseok is lunar 8/15, which falls between early September and early October. The lunar year is about eleven days shorter than the solar year, so each holiday drifts earlier until a leap month is inserted and it jumps back. That is why Chuseok can be in early September one year and late September the next.
Why is Buddha’s Birthday listed but not Christmas Eve or Lunar New Year’s Eve elsewhere?
The calendar follows the regulation exactly rather than common practice. Buddha’s Birthday (lunar 4/8) is a designated public holiday and appears with a substitute rule. Christmas Eve and New Year’s Eve are not public holidays in Korea, however widely they are treated as occasions, so they are absent. The day before and after Seollal and Chuseok are included only because the regulation names them individually, not because they are eves in a general sense.
Does this calendar know about school or company holidays?
No. School vacation periods are set by each school under the education office calendar, and company shutdowns — including the common practice of closing between Christmas and New Year — are decided by each employer. Neither follows a national rule that can be computed, so both are outside what this calendar can tell you. What it gives you is the statutory floor that applies everywhere.
Which time zone decides whether it is a holiday today?
Your own device clock. Korean holidays are defined by the Korean calendar date, so if you are viewing from a time zone that is behind Korea, your today and Seoul today can briefly differ. When the answer matters for something happening in Korea, check the date shown in the list rather than relying on the today banner alone.