England and Wales have eight bank holidays in 2027. Scotland has nine. The gap comes from a few Scottish-only days, plus a Christmas that lands on a weekend and gets pushed into the following week.
Below is the full list of UK bank holidays 2027 by nation, then what those dates mean for your leave and your pay.
UK bank holidays 2027: all dates by nation
| Date | Bank holiday | England and Wales | Scotland |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fri 1 Jan | New Year’s Day | Yes | Yes |
| Mon 4 Jan | 2nd January (substitute day) | No | Yes |
| Fri 26 Mar | Good Friday | Yes | Yes |
| Mon 29 Mar | Easter Monday | Yes | No |
| Mon 3 May | Early May bank holiday | Yes | Yes |
| Mon 31 May | Spring bank holiday | Yes | Yes |
| Mon 2 Aug | Summer bank holiday | No | Yes |
| Mon 30 Aug | Summer bank holiday | Yes | No |
| Tue 30 Nov | St Andrew’s Day | No | Yes |
| Mon 27 Dec | Christmas Day (substitute day) | Yes | Yes |
| Tue 28 Dec | Boxing Day (substitute day) | Yes | Yes |
Wales follows the England column, because GOV.UK publishes a single list for the two. These dates match GOV.UK’s England and Wales list and its Scotland list, both copied from GOV.UK data retrieved on 4 November 2026.
Count the Mondays. Five of the eight English and Welsh holidays fall on one, so 2027 hands out plenty of three-day weekends and very little for anyone hoping to bridge a midweek day.
Why Scotland’s list looks different
Scotland keeps its own calendar, and 2027 shows how far it drifts from the others. Three of its nine holidays fall on dates where neither England and Wales nor Northern Ireland has a bank holiday: Monday 4 January, Monday 2 August and Tuesday 30 November.
Start with 4 January. Scotland marks 2nd January every year, but in 2027 that date is a Saturday, so the day moves to Monday. Put it next to New Year’s Day on the Friday and Scottish workers get a four-day weekend without booking anything. England and Wales get the Friday, then back to work.
Summer splits the same way. Scotland takes Monday 2 August, while England and Wales take Monday 30 August.
Easter differs too: Scotland has Good Friday but no Easter Monday on GOV.UK’s list. St Andrew’s Day, on a Tuesday this year, finishes the set.
One wrinkle for anyone who works across the border. Banks tend to stay open on the Scottish-only days and close when the rest of the UK does, according to the Post Office. So a branch being open on 2 August tells you nothing about your own employer.
Christmas 2027 falls on a weekend
Christmas Day is a Saturday and Boxing Day is a Sunday. That moves both holidays to Monday 27 and Tuesday 28 December in England, Wales and Scotland.
The Royal Proclamation of 8 July 2026 covers the English and Welsh side of this. It appoints Tuesday 28 December under the Banking and Financial Dealings Act 1971. It also appoints Friday 1 January and Monday 3 May.
If you cross-check against other sites and one of them calls 1 January 2027 a Thursday, it has made a mistake. The proclamation says Friday.
How to turn the 2027 bank holidays into longer breaks
Easter gives the best return. Good Friday is 26 March and Easter Monday is 29 March in England and Wales. Take Tuesday 30 March to Friday 2 April, four days of leave, and you’re away from Friday 26 March until Sunday 4 April. That’s ten days in a row.
Scotland has no Easter Monday, so the same ten days cost five days of leave, starting on Monday 29 March.
Christmas works the other way round. Saturday 25 December to Tuesday 28 December is already a four-day stretch. Add Wednesday 29 to Friday 31 December and you’re off until Sunday 2 January, nine days for three days of leave.
One 2028 holiday table also lists Monday 3 January 2028 as a New Year’s substitute day across the UK, which would make it ten. Confirm that one nearer the time.
Scotland has two cheaper tricks. Take Monday 29 November, and St Andrew’s Day on Tuesday 30 November gives you Saturday to Tuesday for one day of leave. And the New Year four-day weekend costs nothing.
The Monday holidays in May and August give three-day weekends and little else, whichever side of the border you’re on.
Do you actually get the day off?
Not automatically. Citizens Advice says bank holidays aren’t extra to your statutory entitlement, and your employer can ask you to use paid holiday for them.
The legal minimum for a five-day week is 28 days of paid leave a year, or 5.6 weeks. An employer can count bank holidays towards that. If a full-time employee takes all eight English and Welsh holidays off, that leaves 20 days to book freely. In Scotland the same sum leaves 19. A contract that says “28 days plus bank holidays” is better, and lawful too. What matters is that yours says which one you have.
Part-time hours change the picture. Acas notes that people who work Mondays use more of their leave on bank holidays than people who don’t. In 2027 that’s easy to see. Someone working Tuesday to Thursday gives up one day of their allowance (28 December). A Monday worker gives up five.
If your workplace shuts on a bank holiday, the same Acas page says your employer can make you take it as holiday, provided the contract says so or you’ve had notice.
Could the dates change?
Occasionally, yes. Scotland had an extra World Cup bank holiday on Monday 15 June 2026, listed by GOV.UK. Whether staff get a one-off day like that depends on their contract, Acas says.
The list above is the current one, but check the GOV.UK bank holidays page again before you pay for anything non-refundable.
If you want the ten-day Easter break, ask for 30 March to 2 April as soon as your employer opens its 2027 leave calendar. In Scotland, ask for 29 March to 2 April instead.
Sources
- Royal Proclamation, 8 July 2026, appointing 2027 bank holidays in England, Wales and Northern Ireland
- Bank holidays 2027 in England and Wales (GOV.UK data, retrieved 4 November 2026)
- Bank holidays 2027 in Scotland (GOV.UK data, retrieved 4 November 2026)
- Bank holidays 2027 by nation, UK Calculator
- How many bank holidays are there in the UK?, Post Office
- Bank holidays and Christmas, Acas
- Holiday pay information for employers, LITRG
- Check if you’re entitled to paid holidays, Citizens Advice
- UK bank holidays 2028 table, PayFit