Public holidays in Slovenia

There are two kinds of public holidays in Slovenia – state holidays and work-free days. State holidays are those celebrated by the state. These include official functions and flying the national flag. The latter are actually Christian religious holidays, which are equivalent to any Sunday: companies and schools are closed, but there is no official celebration.

9 of 14 state holiday days are work-free, and there are additional 6 work-free days in Slovenia.^[1] Two of them always fall on Sunday, thus, there are effectively at most 13 work-free days in Slovenia.

State holidays that are work-free are shown in pale green, while work-free days that are not state holidays (coinciding with Christian religious holidays) are shown in blue.

Table

Date	English name	Slovene name	Remarks
1-2 January	New Year's Day	novo leto	State holiday, work-free. From 1955 until May 2012, when the National Assembly of Slovenia passed the Public Finance Balance Act, 2 January was a work-free day.[2][3] It was reintroduced in 2017.[4]
8 February	Prešeren Day	Prešernov dan	State holiday, work-free. Anniversary of the death of Slovenian poet France Prešeren, established as the national cultural day in 1944, work-free since 1991.[5]
Variable	Easter Sunday and Easter Monday	velikonočna nedelja in ponedeljek, velika noč	Work-free days, in March or April (date varies).
27 April	Day of Uprising Against Occupation	dan upora proti okupatorju	State holiday, work-free. Formerly Liberation Front Day (dan Osvobodilne fronte), marks the establishment in 1941 of a liberation front to fight the German, Italian, Hungarian, and Croatian partition and annexation of Slovenia.
1-2 May	May Day	praznik dela	State holiday, work-free from 1949.[3]
Variable	Whit Sunday	binkoštna nedelja, binkošti	Work-free day (it is always on Sunday), in May or June, fifty days after the Easter (date varies).
25 June	Statehood Day	dan državnosti	State holiday, work-free. Commemorates the act of independence in 1991.
15 August	Assumption Day	Marijino vnebovzetje (veliki šmaren)	Work-free day since 1992.[6]
31 October	Reformation Day	dan reformacije	Civic holiday since 1992,[7] work-free day.[8]
1 November	All Saints' Day	dan spomina na mrtve or dan mrtvih	State holiday, work-free. Before 1991, in the time of the Socialist Republic of Slovenia, it was named dan mrtvih ('day of the dead').[9]
25 December	Christmas Day	božič	Work-free day. Abolished in 1953 and re-instituted in 1991.[3]
26 December	Independence and Unity Day	dan samostojnosti in enotnosti	State holiday, work free. Commemorates the proclamation of the independence plebiscite results in 1990.

Other holidays

In addition to these, several other holidays are traditionally and popularly celebrated by the people of Slovenia, although not being work-free. The best known are:

• Carnival (pust, date varies),
• Slovenian Maritime Day, 7 March
• International Women's Day, 8 March
• St. George's Day (jurjevanje, the welcoming of spring; 23 April),
• St. Martin's Day (martinovanje, changing of must into wine; 11 November)
• Saint Nicholas Day (miklavž, when children receive presents; 6 December)
• Insurrection Day (dan vstaje, 22 July, work-free until 1991)

See also

• Public holidays in Yugoslavia