To find out what Jewish holiday is today, you need the Hebrew date, not just the everyday one. Jewish holidays sit on fixed dates of the lunisolar Hebrew calendar and begin at sundown the evening before, so a holiday listed for a given day actually starts the night prior. A Hebrew calendar or Hebcal answers it in seconds.
How Do You Check If Today Is a Jewish Holiday?
The fastest route is a Jewish calendar that already does the math. Hebcal lists every major and minor holiday with its Gregorian dates and its start and end times, and our own Jewish holiday calendar lays the year out season by season with each holiday's Hebrew date. If you want to understand what you are looking at, though, four checks cover almost every case:
- Find today's Hebrew date. Every holiday is pinned to a day of a Hebrew month, like the 25th of Kislev for Hanukkah or the 15th of Nisan for Passover. A Hebrew date converter turns any Gregorian date into its Hebrew equivalent.
- Remember that the day starts at sundown. If a calendar says a holiday falls on Thursday, it began on Wednesday evening. That is why so many listings read "begins at sundown."
- Know whether you are in Israel or outside it. Several holidays run one day longer outside Israel, so the same holiday can end on different days in Tel Aviv and in Chicago.
- Do not forget the weekly and monthly days. Shabbat arrives every Friday at sundown, and Rosh Chodesh marks the start of each Hebrew month. Neither shows up as a headline holiday, but both are part of the Jewish calendar.
Here is one example of how those rules work together. On Friday, December 4, 2026, the Hebrew date during the daytime is the 24th of Kislev. At sundown it becomes the 25th of Kislev, so the first Hanukkah candle is lit that Friday evening, even though the 25th falls mostly on Saturday on the everyday calendar.
Why Does the Jewish Calendar Follow Both the Moon and the Sun?
The Hebrew calendar is lunisolar, which means its months follow the moon while its years are kept in step with the sun. Each month begins with the new moon and runs 29 or 30 days. Twelve of those months add up to a year of about 354 days, according to Chabad.org, which notes a regular year can also run 353 or 355 days. A solar year is close to 365 and a quarter days.
That gap of roughly eleven days a year would, left alone, push every holiday steadily backward through the seasons. Passover would eventually land in winter, then fall. The Torah does not allow that: it commands that Passover be kept in the spring. So the calendar adds a thirteenth month, a second Adar, in seven out of every nineteen years. Per My Jewish Learning, the leap years fall in the 3rd, 6th, 8th, 11th, 14th, 17th, and 19th years of each nineteen-year cycle. In a leap year the two months are called Adar I and Adar II, and Purim is celebrated in Adar II so it stays a month before Passover.
For centuries, each new month was declared in Jerusalem based on witnesses who saw the new moon. Jewish tradition holds that in the fourth century CE, a sage named Hillel II set out the fixed, calculated calendar with its nineteen-year cycle, and that system is still the one every Jewish calendar uses today.
Why Do Jewish Holidays Start at Sundown?
Because the Jewish day itself starts at night. The creation story in Genesis closes each day with the phrase "and it was evening and it was morning," with evening coming first. As Chabad.org explains, Jewish law reads that literally: a Jewish date runs from nightfall to nightfall, not midnight to midnight.
In practice that gives every holiday an evening start and an evening finish:
- Shabbat and holidays begin at sunset. Candles are lit shortly before sundown. Hebcal's default candle-lighting time is 18 minutes before sundown, with longer customs in Jerusalem and a few other cities, according to Hebcal.
- They end at nightfall the following evening, traditionally when three stars are visible in the sky. That is why holiday listings say "ends at nightfall" rather than "ends at sunset."
- Some rituals still happen in daylight. Hearing the shofar on Rosh Hashanah and reading the Megillah on Purim, for example, have daytime obligations even though the holiday began the night before.
So if a friend says "Passover is on Thursday," the first seder is almost certainly Wednesday night.
Why Are Some Holidays Longer Outside Israel?
In ancient times, the court in Jerusalem announced each new month after witnesses reported the new moon, and messengers carried the news outward.
In ancient times, the court in Jerusalem announced each new month after witnesses reported the new moon, and messengers carried the news outward. Distant communities could not always learn in time which day the month had started. As a safeguard, as My Jewish Learning describes, communities outside Israel kept an extra festival day so at least one day would land on the correct date.
The custom stuck even after the calendar became fixed. Today, traditional communities outside Israel add a day to Passover, Shavuot, and Sukkot, and keep Simchat Torah as a separate day after Shemini Atzeret. Rosh Hashanah is two days everywhere, including in Israel. The Reform movement in the United States officially dropped the extra days, except for Rosh Hashanah, so a Reform family and an Orthodox family on the same street may end Passover on different nights. Both are working from the same calendar.
Why Does the Holiday's Date Change Every Year?
On the Hebrew calendar, it does not change at all. Rosh Hashanah is always the 1st of Tishrei, Hanukkah always begins on the 25th of Kislev, and Passover always begins on the 15th of Nisan. What moves is where those Hebrew dates land on the Gregorian calendar most Americans keep on the fridge.
In a regular year, a holiday tends to arrive about eleven days earlier than it did the year before. In a leap year, the extra month pushes it later. You can see it in real dates verified on Hebcal: Passover began at sundown on April 1, 2026, and will begin at sundown on April 21, 2027, nearly three weeks later, because the Hebrew year 5787 is a leap year with two months of Adar. That is also why Hanukkah moves around December, sometimes brushing Thanksgiving, sometimes landing on Christmas Eve.
What Are the Jewish Holidays by Hebrew Date?
Because the Hebrew dates are fixed, this list works every year. Each holiday begins at sundown the evening before the date shown.
- Rosh Hashanah: 1 and 2 Tishrei. The Jewish New Year, with the shofar and apples dipped in honey.
- Yom Kippur: 10 Tishrei. The Day of Atonement, a 25-hour fast.
- Sukkot: begins 15 Tishrei. A week of meals in the sukkah, followed by Shemini Atzeret and Simchat Torah.
- Hanukkah: begins 25 Kislev. Eight nights of lights.
- Tu BiShvat: 15 Shevat. The New Year of the Trees.
- Purim: 14 Adar, or 14 Adar II in a leap year. Costumes, the Megillah, and hamantaschen.
- Passover: begins 15 Nisan. Seven days in Israel, eight outside it.
- Shavuot: 6 Sivan. One day in Israel, two outside it.
- Tisha B'Av: 9 Av. A fast day mourning the destruction of the Temples.
If you are new to what each of these holidays actually involves, our Jewish holidays guide for beginners walks through the whole year, from the High Holidays to the ones most people have never heard of.
Which Jewish Holidays Are Coming Up Next?
As of this article's publication on October 10, 2026, the Hebrew date is the 29th of Tishrei, 5787, and the fall holiday season has just wrapped up. Here is what is next, verified against Hebcal. Each one begins at sundown on the date listed:
- Hanukkah: Friday, December 4, 2026, through nightfall on Saturday, December 12.
- Tu BiShvat: Friday, January 22, 2027.
- Purim: Monday, March 22, 2027.
- Passover: Wednesday, April 21, 2027.
- Shavuot: Thursday, June 10, 2027.
- Tisha B'Av: Wednesday, August 11, 2027.
- Rosh Hashanah 5788: Friday, October 1, 2027.
- Yom Kippur: Sunday, October 10, 2027.
Exact start and end times depend on your city, because sundown does. Check a local calendar for the minute-by-minute times where you live.
Is Shabbat a Jewish Holiday?
Yes, and by count it is the most frequent one. Shabbat begins every Friday at sundown and ends Saturday at nightfall. Keeping it is one of the Ten Commandments, which is more than Hanukkah can say, since Hanukkah does not appear in the Hebrew Bible at all. So if someone asks whether today is a Jewish holiday and it is Friday night, the honest answer is yes, every single week.
What Is the Easiest Way to Keep Track?
Pick one source and let it do the work. A synagogue calendar, a Jewish calendar app, or Hebcal's free listings will give you the dates and local times. You can also add the holiday dates to your phone's calendar so they show up next to everything else, starting on the right evening. And if a date ever looks off by a day, check two things before anything else: whether the listing counts from sundown, and whether it follows the Israel or the diaspora schedule. Nine times out of ten, that is the whole mystery.