Festival dates 2026

Festival Dates 2026: Navratri to Chhath

Dates for the 2026 festival season, cross-checked against published panchangs, with the key timing for Delhi. Open a festival for timings in 20 cities.

How festival dates are set

Hindu festivals follow the lunisolar calendar, not the Gregorian one. Each festival is tied to a tithi, a lunar day defined by the angle between the Sun and the Moon: every 12 degrees of separation makes one tithi, so a lunar month has 30 of them. Diwali falls on Amavasya, the new moon, and Bhai Dooj on the second tithi after it.

Twelve lunar months last about 354 days, roughly 11 days shorter than the solar year, so most festivals arrive about 11 days earlier each year. Every two to three years an extra lunar month, Adhik Maas, is added to keep the calendar in step with the seasons, and festivals then move about 19 days later. 2026 has an Adhik Maas, which is why this year's dates fall later than in 2025.

A tithi does not start at sunrise or midnight. It can begin at any hour and lasts roughly 19 to 26 hours, so the question for each festival is on which day its tithi is present at a set time of day. Navratri starts on the day Pratipada is present at sunrise, Diwali is the day Amavasya is present during Pradosh Kaal after sunset, and Karva Chauth is the day Krishna Chaturthi is present at moonrise.

The deciding time for each festival

Sharad Navratri
Ashvin Shukla Pratipada at sunrise. The Ghatasthapana window is the first third of that day.
Dussehra
Ashvin Shukla Dashami during Aparahna, the afternoon. Vijay Muhurat is the 11th muhurta of the day.
Karva Chauth
Kartik Krishna Chaturthi at moonrise, which is calculated separately for each city.
Dhanteras
Kartik Krishna Trayodashi during Pradosh Kaal, the first three muhurtas after sunset.
Diwali
Kartik Amavasya during Pradosh Kaal. Lakshmi Puja is done within this window.
Bhai Dooj
Kartik Shukla Dwitiya during Aparahna, the 4th of the day's five parts.
Chhath Puja
Kartik Shukla Shashthi at sunset, for Sandhya Arghya. Usha Arghya follows at the next sunrise.

Month names follow the Purnimanta calendar used in north India.

Why your panchang may show a different day

When a tithi starts or ends close to the deciding time, two panchangs can disagree. Sunrise, sunset and moonrise change from city to city, by up to about an hour between east and west India, so a tithi can be present at the deciding time in Kolkata but not in Mumbai. Some traditions also use a different rule, such as taking the tithi present at sunrise for the whole day.

Calculation methods differ too. Most modern panchangs, including the ones these dates were checked against, use present-day astronomical positions (drik ganita); some traditional almanacs still use older formulas, which can move a tithi boundary by some hours. If your family or temple follows a particular panchang, use its date.

Month names: Purnimanta and Amanta

North India mostly uses the Purnimanta calendar, where a month ends on the full moon. Much of south and west India uses Amanta, where a month ends on the new moon. The waning half of the month therefore carries a different month name: the Amavasya of Diwali is Kartik Amavasya in Purnimanta and Ashvin Amavasya in Amanta. The festival falls on the same day in both.

Related tools

All times are in IST, calculated with astronomy-engine for each city's coordinates. Festival dates are taken from published panchangs, not calculated by AstroMystra.

Where your family priest or local panchang gives a different time, follow them. These pages are for general information.

Festival Dates 2026: Navratri, Diwali, Chhath and More | AstroMystra