> Quick view: after Maulidur Rasul on 25 August, ten gazetted holiday dates remain in 2026 — and only four of them are federal. Three days of leave (26–28 August) still buys seven consecutive days off, 25 to 31 August. Deepavali falls on Sunday 8 November and Sarawak does not observe it. Christmas falls on a Friday — the weekly rest day in Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu. And the 2027 federal schedule is already published: six of its fifteen dates land on a weekend.

Where these dates come from

Public holiday lists circulate freely in August, and most of them are copies of copies. The dates below come from one document: the Jadual Hari Kelepasan Am Persekutuan dan Negeri 2026, issued by the Bahagian Kabinet, Perlembagaan dan Perhubungan Antara Kerajaan — the Cabinet, Constitution and Inter-Government Relations Division of the Jabatan Perdana Menteri — at Aras 4 Timur, Bangunan Perdana Putra, Putrajaya, and published on its own portal at kabinet.gov.my. It runs to 49 numbered entries covering both federal and state holidays and marks, state by state, which ones apply where.

The school dates come from the Kalendar Akademik Tahun 2026 (Surat Siaran KPM Bil. 3/2025) issued by the Ministry of Education and distributed through the same portal.

We re-read all three documents on 25 August 2026. The BKPP holiday page itself carries a *tarikh kemaskini* of 21 August 2026, and it now also hosts the 2027 federal schedule — which is why there is a 2027 section at the bottom of this article.

Where we go beyond those documents — the long-weekend arithmetic, and the question of what happens when a holiday lands on a rest day — we say so, and we cite the Act.

What is actually left in 2026

Maulidur Rasul (25 August) and the Melaka Yang di-Pertua Negeri's birthday (24 August) have now been taken. From 31 August to the end of the year, ten gazetted holiday dates remain — four federal, six state-only.

  • Monday 31 August — Hari Kebangsaan / Merdeka — nationwide (federal)
  • Wednesday 16 September — Hari Malaysia — nationwide (federal)
  • Tuesday 29 September — Hari Keputeraan Sultan Kelantan — Kelantan only
  • Wednesday 30 September — Hari Keputeraan Sultan Kelantan, second day — Kelantan only
  • Saturday 10 October — Hari Jadi Yang di-Pertua Negeri Sarawak — Sarawak only
  • Friday 6 November — Hari Keputeraan Sultan Perak — Perak only
  • Sunday 8 November — Deepavali — all states and federal territories except Sarawak
  • Friday 11 December — Hari Keputeraan Sultan Selangor — Selangor only
  • Thursday 24 December — Christmas Eve — Sabah only
  • Friday 25 December — Hari Krismas — nationwide (federal)

Ten dates, but nine distinct holidays, because Kelantan's Sultan's birthday runs across two consecutive days. Note what is not on this list: Hari Jadi Yang di-Pertua Negeri Sabah moved to 30 March in 2025 and no longer falls in October, so Sabah has nothing left before Christmas Eve.

The August window: what is still bookable today

The ten-day version of this break — Saturday 22 August straight through to Monday 31 August — needed leave booked before the weekend, and that ship has sailed. Here is what the same calendar still gives you from today.

Maulidur Rasul is today, Tuesday 25 August. Merdeka is Monday 31 August. Between them sit exactly three working days.

  • Three days of leave (Wednesday 26, Thursday 27, Friday 28 August): the whole back half joins up — Tuesday 25 August to Monday 31 August, seven consecutive days off. Three days of leave for seven days is still the best ratio left in 2026.
  • One day of leave (Friday 28 August): Friday 28 to Monday 31 August, a four-day weekend for a single day.
  • No leave at all: Saturday 29 to Monday 31 August, an ordinary three-day weekend.

In Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu the arithmetic is different, because the working week there runs Sunday to Thursday. The three days you would need are Wednesday 26, Thursday 27 and Sunday 30 August — Friday and Saturday are already rest days — and the run is the same seven days.

The catch is unchanged and it is now acute: schools are already going into their second-term break, 28 August to 5 September in Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu and 29 August to 6 September everywhere else. Domestic flights and east-coast accommodation over that window are not going to be cheap, and booking three days out will not help.

The rest of the long weekends

Hari Malaysia, Wednesday 16 September. The worst-placed holiday of the year — a Wednesday gives you nothing for free. Two days of leave on either side (14–15 or 17–18 September) turns it into a five-day break.

Kelantan, 29 and 30 September. The Sultan's birthday takes a Tuesday and a Wednesday. Remember that Kelantan's weekly rest days are Friday and Saturday, so the working week there runs Sunday to Thursday. Three days of leave — Sunday 27, Monday 28 and Thursday 1 October — produces a nine-day break from Friday 25 September to Saturday 3 October.

Sarawak, Saturday 10 October. Falling on a Saturday, it buys nothing extra for most workers.

Perak, Friday 6 November and Selangor, Friday 11 December. Clean three-day weekends, no leave required.

Christmas, Friday 25 December. A three-day weekend nationwide. In Sabah, Christmas Eve on Thursday 24 December makes it four days without touching your leave. Four days of leave (28–31 December) would carry you through to New Year's Day, which falls on a Friday in 2027 — so in the states where 1 January is gazetted (it is a state holiday, and five of the sixteen states and territories do not take it), those four days buy you 24 December to Sunday 3 January: eleven days.

Deepavali falls on a Sunday — what that means

Deepavali is listed as 8 November 2026, a Sunday. Three things about that entry are worth stating plainly.

First, the official schedule marks it "subject to change". In the 2026 federal list, the asterisked entries — the ones flagged as *tertakluk kepada perubahan* — are Hari Raya Puasa, Hari Raya Qurban and Deepavali. The first two have already passed. Deepavali has not.

Second, the substitution question. Section 3 of the Holidays Act 1951 (Act 369) provides that where a public holiday falls on a weekly holiday, the day following shall be a public holiday — and, in a detail most summaries drop, if that following day is itself already a public holiday, the day after that becomes one instead. Section 2 defines "weekly holiday" as Sunday, or Friday in states that observe Friday as the weekly holiday. Crucially, the whole proviso applies only where the State Authority, or the Minister in the case of the Federal Territory, has not gazetted otherwise.

Third — and this is the part that almost every calendar online gets wrong — Act 369 does not apply to the whole country. Section 1(2) limits it to the States of Peninsular Malaysia, with section 2 bringing the Federal Territory within that definition. Sabah and Sarawak legislate their own public holidays separately, so nothing in the reasoning above settles what happens there.

So the honest answer for the Peninsula is: a substitute Monday 9 November is what the Act's default rule points to for states where Sunday is the weekly rest day, but it is a state-level gazette decision, and the federal schedule itself lists only 8 November. Several commercial holiday calendars are **already printing 9 November as a confirmed *cuti ganti*. The gazetted federal schedule does not, as of 25 August 2026. Wait for your state's announcement rather than booking flights on the assumption.**

In Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu, where the weekly rest days are Friday and Saturday, Sunday is an ordinary working day, so the substitution question does not arise for Deepavali at all. Johor is no longer in that group — it reverted to a Saturday–Sunday weekend on 1 January 2025, so Johor now sits with the rest of the Peninsula on this question. Plenty of 2026 holiday guides still list Johor as a Friday–Saturday state; they are two years out of date.

And a point that gets lost every year: Sarawak does not observe Deepavali. It is the only one of the sixteen states and federal territories absent from that row in the federal schedule.

Christmas falls on a Friday — which is a Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu question

Here is the mirror image of the Deepavali problem, and almost nobody flags it.

Hari Krismas 2026 falls on Friday 25 December — a federal holiday, nationwide. But in Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu, Friday *is* the weekly holiday within the meaning of section 2 of Act 369. On the face of the statute, the same substitution proviso is engaged: the day following would become a public holiday, and because Saturday is also a rest day in those states, the cascade in section 3 is exactly the kind of situation the drafters had in mind.

We are not going to tell you the answer, because the proviso is expressly subject to whatever the State Authority gazettes, and no such notification for December 2026 has been published as of 25 August. What we will tell you is that if you work in Kedah, Kelantan or Terengganu, this is a question worth asking your HR department in November, not on 24 December.

The state holidays outsiders keep missing

If you run a business across state lines, or you are trying to reach someone in another state, these are the dates that catch people out:

  • Kelantan, Tuesday 29 and Wednesday 30 September — two consecutive days, and the only two-day state holiday left this year.
  • Sarawak, Saturday 10 October — the Yang di-Pertua Negeri's birthday.
  • Perak, Friday 6 November — the Sultan's birthday.
  • Selangor, Friday 11 December — the Sultan's birthday. Note this is Selangor only; Kuala Lumpur, Putrajaya and Labuan do not get it.
  • Sabah, Thursday 24 December — Christmas Eve is a gazetted state holiday in Sabah and nowhere else.

School holidays for the rest of 2026

The Education Ministry splits schools into two groups. Group A is Kedah, Kelantan and Terengganu — the same three states that keep a Friday–Saturday weekend. Group B is everyone else: Johor, Melaka, Negeri Sembilan, Pahang, Perak, Perlis, Pulau Pinang, Sabah, Sarawak, Selangor and the three federal territories.

  • Second-term break — Group A: 28 August to 5 September 2026, 9 days. Group B: 29 August to 6 September 2026, 9 days
  • Year-end break — Group A: 4 to 31 December 2026, 28 days. Group B: 5 to 31 December 2026, 27 days

Two planning consequences. The second-term break overlaps the Merdeka long weekend almost exactly, which is why late August is the most expensive domestic travel window left this year. And the year-end break starts a Friday in Group A and a Saturday in Group B, so the exodus begins on the evening of Thursday 3 December.

The 2027 schedule is already out — and it is a poor year

The BKPP portal now carries the Jadual Hari Kelepasan Am Persekutuan 2027. If you plan leave a year ahead, plan early, because 2027 wastes an unusual amount of the calendar on weekends.

  • Saturday 6 February — Tahun Baharu Cina
  • Sunday 7 February — Tahun Baharu Cina, second day
  • Wednesday 10 March — Hari Raya Puasa *(subject to change)*
  • Thursday 11 March — Hari Raya Puasa, second day *(subject to change)*
  • Saturday 1 May — Hari Pekerja
  • Monday 17 May — Hari Raya Qurban *(subject to change)*
  • Tuesday 18 May — Hari Raya Qurban, second day *(subject to change)*
  • Thursday 20 May — Hari Wesak
  • Sunday 6 June — Awal Muharam
  • Monday 7 June — Hari Keputeraan Rasmi Yang di-Pertuan Agong
  • Sunday 15 August — Maulidur Rasul
  • Tuesday 31 August — Hari Kebangsaan
  • Thursday 16 September — Hari Malaysia
  • Thursday 28 October — Hari Deepavali *(subject to change)*
  • Saturday 25 December — Hari Krismas

Six of those fifteen dates fall on a Saturday or a Sunday — both days of Chinese New Year, Labour Day, Awal Muharam, Maulidur Rasul and Christmas. That is a lot of holiday to lose to the weekend, and it makes the good windows in 2027 unusually valuable:

  • Mid-May is the prize. Hari Raya Qurban takes Monday 17 and Tuesday 18 May, and Wesak takes Thursday 20 May. Take just two days of leave — Wednesday 19 and Friday 21 May — and you get Saturday 15 May to Sunday 23 May, nine consecutive days. Two days of leave for nine days off is the best ratio in either year covered by this article.
  • Deepavali, Thursday 28 October. One day of leave on Friday 29 October makes a four-day weekend.
  • Merdeka, Tuesday 31 August. One day of leave on Monday 30 August makes a four-day weekend.
  • Free of charge: Awal Muharam on Sunday 6 June is followed by the Agong's birthday on Monday 7 June, so 5–7 June is a three-day weekend with no leave at all.

The usual caveats apply harder to a schedule this far out: Hari Raya Puasa, Hari Raya Qurban and Deepavali are all asterisked as *subject to change*, and the 2027 state-by-state list can still be amended.

Planning notes

  • The August window is down to its last version. Three days of leave for seven days off, 25 to 31 August. After that the next genuinely good break is mid-May 2027.
  • Do not assume a Monday substitute for Deepavali. Check your state's gazette notification, and be aware that commercial calendars are printing 9 November as settled when the federal schedule is not.
  • Check the state, not the country. Six of the ten remaining dates apply in a single state only.
  • Act 369 is a Peninsular statute. If you are in Sabah, Sarawak or Labuan, substitution questions are answered by your own state's law, not by the Holidays Act 1951.
  • Islamic-calendar dates can move. Maulidur Rasul was not asterisked in the 2026 federal schedule, but Islamic observances generally remain subject to official confirmation, and the 2027 Raya dates are asterisked.
  • Employers and employees: entitlement to paid public holidays, and to substitute days, is governed by the Employment Act and your contract, not by this article. This is a summary of published dates, not employment advice.

Sources

Every 2026 and 2027 date above is from the Jadual Hari Kelepasan Am Persekutuan dan Negeri 2026 and the Jadual Hari Kelepasan Am Persekutuan 2027, both published by the Bahagian Kabinet, Perlembagaan dan Perhubungan Antara Kerajaan, Jabatan Perdana Menteri (kabinet.gov.my), read on 25 August 2026 from a page carrying an update date of 21 August 2026. School dates are from the Kalendar Akademik Tahun 2026 (Surat Siaran KPM Bil. 3/2025) distributed on the same portal. The substitution rule, the cascade where the following day is itself a holiday, the definition of "weekly holiday" and the Peninsular-only application are from sections 1, 2 and 3 of the Holidays Act 1951 (Act 369), read from the copy hosted on the same government portal. Johor's return to a Saturday–Sunday weekend from 1 January 2025 was decreed by the Regent of Johor in October 2024 and widely reported. Gazetted holidays can be amended, and state authorities may declare additional holidays at short notice — check your state's own announcement before making non-refundable plans.

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*Cover image: CEphoto, Uwe Aranas / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0*