Labor Day 2027: 146 Countries on 1 May, US on 6 September

In short: Labor Day 2027 is Monday 6 September in the United States and Canada. In 146 of the 192 countries we track, the labour holiday is 1 May instead — a Saturday in 2027 — and only 26 territories move that day off to a weekday. The other 126 lose it to the weekend.

9 November 2026 — Ask when Labor Day 2027 falls and you get two answers: the first Monday in September in North America, and 1 May almost everywhere else. Because 1 May 2027 is a Saturday, the second answer has a wrinkle this year. Every count below comes from our 2027 public holidays by country pages, under one rule throughout: a date counts only when its type is National, Substitute or Bank.

When Is Labor Day 2027? Two Dates, One Question

In the United States, Labor Day 2027 is Monday 6 September. Federal law fixes it as the first Monday in September, an arrangement dating from 1894, so the date can land anywhere from 1 to 7 September. Canada applies the same rule and takes the same Monday. American Samoa and Palau follow it as well.

Most of the world answers differently. Our 192-country 2027 dataset records a public holiday on 1 May in 146 countries, 76% of the list. Of those, 142 name it a labour, workers’ or May Day holiday. The date marks the 1886 Haymarket events in Chicago and was adopted as an international workers’ day by the Second International in 1889.

The September date is a North American habit rather than a global one. It grew out of trade-union parade days in the 1880s and became a federal holiday in 1894, which is why the United States and Canada never joined the May Day tradition that most industrialised countries adopted from 1890 onwards.

Why 1 May 2027 Is a Saturday, and What It Costs

The 2027 calendar puts 1 May on a Saturday and 2 May on a Sunday. Where the national rule treats a weekend date as absorbed, the labour holiday vanishes without trace: no substitute row, no extra day. That is the majority outcome. Of the 146 countries with a 1 May holiday, 126 get no weekday back at all.

The pattern shifts year by year. 1 May fell on a Friday in 2026 and will be a Monday in 2028, when the holiday arrives with a three-day weekend attached. 2027 is the awkward year, and the countries that handle it best are those whose statutes substitute weekend holidays rather than only Sunday ones.

Substitution rules explain the difference between countries that share a date. Some statutes move any weekend holiday to the next working day, others move only Sunday holidays, and a large group provides no substitute at all. Two countries can mark the same 1 May and still end up with very different weeks.

We do not fill that gap ourselves. A country page lists a substitute day only when the national rule creates one, which is why so many May 2027 pages look thin around the first weekend of the month. That is deliberate: it keeps our counts comparable with the official calendars we check them against.

The 26 Territories That Move the Day Off

Twenty-six territories hand back a weekday. Nineteen take Monday 3 May. Fourteen of them keep a 1 May row and add a substitute, a day in lieu or a bridging holiday: Albania, Botswana, China, Equatorial Guinea, Gambia, South Korea, Laos, Malawi, Montenegro, Nigeria, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Thailand and Vietnam. The other five define the labour holiday as the first Monday in May — Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Ireland, Saint Kitts and Nevis, and the UK 2027 bank holidays.

Four take Tuesday 4 May: Bulgaria, China, Greece and Serbia, because Monday is already spoken for by Orthodox Easter. Three more take Friday 30 April — Ecuador, São Tomé and Príncipe and Taiwan — and Mexico is recorded on that Friday alone. China is the only country in two groups, which gives it four consecutive days, 1 to 4 May. The China 2027 public holidays page lists all four rows by type.

The table below covers the 146 countries that list a holiday on 1 May and shows where the weekday falls for each. A dash means no weekday is given back: the holiday is spent on the weekend and nothing replaces it. China appears in two rows.

Two May Days in the Balkans: When Orthodox Easter Collides

Orthodox Easter 2027 falls on Sunday 2 May, 35 days after Western Easter on 28 March. That single fact reshapes the first week of May across south-eastern Europe, because Orthodox Easter Monday lands on 3 May — the very Monday other countries use for their substitute.

Greece shows the squeeze. Its page lists Good Friday on 30 April, Labor Day on 1 May, Easter Monday on 3 May and Labor Day (observed) on 4 May: five consecutive days off, 30 April to 4 May. Serbia matches it, with Holy Saturday and Labor Day sharing 1 May, and Easter Sunday sharing 2 May. Bulgaria runs the same five days, starting with Good Friday.

Georgia is the clearest warning against reading “1 May holiday” as “labour day”. Its 1 May row is Holy Saturday, not a workers’ holiday at all. Albania stacks both: labour day on 1 May, Orthodox Easter Sunday on 2 May, then substitutes on 3 and 4 May. The Easter 2027 dates explain why the Orthodox date lands so late.

Countries That Skip 1 May Entirely

Forty-six of the 192 countries have no 1 May holiday at all. Most keep a labour holiday on another date, often one tied to a Monday. The United States, Canada, American Samoa and Palau take the first Monday in September; New Zealand takes the fourth Monday in October. The US 2027 federal holidays page puts 6 September among 15 holiday dates for the year.

Others choose a fixed date. Jamaica’s National Labour Day is 23 May, a Sunday in 2027, so Monday 24 May is observed. The Bahamas marks Randol Fawkes Labour Day on Friday 4 June, Trinidad and Tobago on Saturday 19 June, and Japan keeps Labor Thanksgiving Day on Tuesday 23 November, well clear of its Golden Week.

Three European countries have no 1 May holiday at all: Denmark, the Netherlands and Switzerland all take Ascension Day on 6 May instead. Their May pages look short for that reason rather than because a row is missing. Ascension Day gives each of them a Thursday off, which becomes a four-day break only if the Friday is taken as leave.

The Longest Breaks Around May Day 2027

Kyrgyzstan wins by a distance. Its 2027 page runs Labor Day on 1 May, “May Holidays” on 2, 3, 4, 6, 7 and 8 May, Constitution Day on 5 May and Victory Day on 9 May: nine consecutive days off, 1 to 9 May, with no working day in between.

Japan gets five days, 1 to 5 May, but not because of labour. 1 May is only a Saturday there, and the holidays that follow are Constitution Day, Greenery Day and Children’s Day. The Japan 2027 public holidays page lists the run, and our Japan long weekends 2027 breakdown places it in the full year.

Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia also reach five days, 30 April to 4 May, through the Orthodox Easter overlap described above. China turns the same weekend into four days by adding two substitute days. Across the dataset, 40 territories get a run of at least three days off that touches 1 to 4 May; the long weekends in 2027 guide covers the rest of the year.

South Korea comes close for Labor Day 2027 but stops short. It grants 1 May, an alternative holiday on 3 May and Children’s Day on 5 May, yet Tuesday 4 May remains a working day there, so the run splits into a three-day weekend and a single day.

How We Count a Public Holiday

Every figure here comes from one three-type rule. A date counts when its page type is National, Substitute or Bank. Observance, Religious and Regional rows are excluded, which is why a country can look empty in early May while still marking the day locally. Easter Monday is typed National everywhere on the site, including Ireland.

Long weekends follow the same method in every country: holidays plus weekends, merged, with any run of three or more consecutive days counted once. A Saturday holiday that no statute replaces produces no run at all, so it never appears in our break counts.

Where Our 2027 Data Is Thinner Than It Looks

Three gaps are worth knowing before you plan. Australia’s Labour Day is set state by state and typed Regional, so no national row appears; its Australia 2027 public holidays page carries ANZAC Day and the national dates only. India’s May Day is a state matter across most of the country. Mexico is recorded on Friday 30 April 2027, the observed date, rather than on the statutory 1 May.

Naming adds a second layer. Poland’s 1 May row is titled National Day, which is how the page labels the Polish labour holiday. Holy See lists 1 May as Saint Joseph the Worker’s Day. Both are holidays on the date, yet neither carries the words “labour day”, so keyword counting alone would miss them.

What to Check Before You Book

Check the weekday, not the date. If your plan depends on a three-day break, the day that matters in 2027 is Monday 3 May, and only 19 territories grant it. Do not assume a substitute either: 126 of the 146 countries with a 1 May holiday simply lose the day.

Then confirm the row. Country pages list a type against every date, so you can see whether a day is National, a Substitute or an observance before booking anything non-refundable. For Labor Day 2027 the useful question is not the date but the weekday, and for 2028 the problem disappears: 1 May falls on a Monday and the holiday arrives intact.

Public Holiday Calendar editorial team
privacy@publicholidaycalendar.com

About Public Holiday Calendar

Public Holiday Calendar publishes national holiday dates for 192 countries and territories across 2025, 2026 and 2027. Each country has a hub page and a page per year. Every entry carries a type — National, Substitute or Bank, or one of the excluded Observance, Religious and Regional types — so any count in this article can be checked row by row.

Contact

Corrections are welcome at privacy@publicholidaycalendar.com. If a 2027 date on a country page disagrees with a government gazette or an official calendar, send the source and we will re-check the row against it. We publish a date only when we can trace it to a calendar rule or an official announcement.