France Public Holidays: The 11 Jours Feries, Alsace-Moselle and Ponts
France has eleven national public holidays, but only one is a guaranteed day off for every employee. Add Alsace-Moselle and the habit of bridging, and May becomes a planning puzzle.
A product team plans a launch for mid-May and discovers that its Paris office will be thin on the ground for most of the month. One holiday falls on a Thursday, another on a Monday, two more on Fridays, and a good share of the team has booked the gaps. This is a normal French May. Understanding why requires three pieces: the national list, the special status of Alsace-Moselle, and the tradition of faire le pont.
The eleven national holidays
French labour law lists eleven public holidays (jours fériés):
| Holiday | Date |
|---|---|
| New Year's Day | 1 January |
| Easter Monday | Monday after Easter Sunday |
| Labour Day | 1 May |
| Victory in Europe Day | 8 May |
| Ascension Day | Thursday, 39 days after Easter Sunday |
| Whit Monday | Monday, 50 days after Easter Sunday |
| Bastille Day (Fête nationale) | 14 July |
| Assumption | 15 August |
| All Saints' Day | 1 November |
| Armistice Day | 11 November |
| Christmas Day | 25 December |
Good Friday and Boxing Day are not on the national list. Holidays that fall on a weekend are not moved, so in some years several of the eleven are effectively lost for Monday-to-Friday workers.
Only 1 May is guaranteed
This surprises many people. Under French law, 1 May is the only public holiday that must be a paid day off for employees, apart from businesses that by their nature cannot stop work. For the other ten, whether staff are off and paid depends on the collective agreement for the sector, company agreements or established practice. In most office jobs they are days off in practice, but in retail, hospitality, healthcare and transport, working on public holidays is common. Check your contract and the applicable collective agreement.
Whit Monday and the solidarity day
Since 2004, French employees work one unpaid "solidarity day" a year to fund care for elderly and disabled people, introduced after the 2003 heatwave. It was originally fixed on Whit Monday. Employers now choose how to arrange it, and some still use Whit Monday, so that day may be a working day for some teams and a holiday for others.
Alsace-Moselle: two extra days
The three départements of Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin and Moselle were part of Germany between 1871 and 1918, and kept parts of the local law in force at the time. Among the results are two additional public holidays:
- Good Friday
- St Stephen's Day (26 December)
That brings the total to thirteen in Alsace-Moselle. Local rules there also treat public holidays as days off more generally than in the rest of France. If you have staff in Strasbourg, Mulhouse or Metz, they need their own calendar.
Overseas territories
Each overseas department also commemorates the abolition of slavery as a public holiday, on a date that differs by territory. Other local days exist as well. Do not reuse the metropolitan calendar for staff overseas.
Faire le pont
When a holiday falls on a Tuesday or Thursday, the day between it and the weekend becomes a natural candidate for a day off. Taking it is called faire le pont, making the bridge. Ascension is always a Thursday, so the Friday after it is the most predictable bridge of the year. The bridge day is not a public holiday. Some employers close and count it as a day of paid leave for everyone; others leave it to individual leave requests. Either way, expect low attendance.
Worked example: May 2026 vs May 2027
Easter Sunday is 5 April in 2026 and 28 March in 2027. That moves Ascension and Whit Monday, and the weekday on which 1 and 8 May fall changes too.
| May 2026 | May 2027 | |
|---|---|---|
| Weekdays in May | 21 | 21 |
| Labour Day, 1 May | Friday: −1 | Saturday: 0 |
| Victory in Europe Day, 8 May | Friday: −1 | Saturday: 0 |
| Ascension | Thu 14 May: −1 | Thu 6 May: −1 |
| Whit Monday | Mon 25 May: −1 | Mon 17 May: −1 |
| Working days | 17 | 19 |
| With the Ascension bridge taken | 16 | 18 |
If your company uses Whit Monday as the solidarity day, add one back to each figure. May 2026 gives four three-day weekends and one four-day weekend; May 2027 loses two holidays to Saturdays entirely. The same office can have three more working days in one May than in the previous year.
Later in 2027, Armistice Day falls on Thursday 11 November, creating another bridge on Friday 12 November, while Christmas Day is a Saturday and is not replaced.
How many holidays actually land on weekdays
Because nothing is moved, the useful number for planning is not eleven but the count that falls Monday to Friday. In 2027 that count is low:
| Holiday | 2027 date | Weekday? |
|---|---|---|
| New Year's Day | Friday 1 January | Yes |
| Easter Monday | 29 March | Yes |
| Labour Day | Saturday 1 May | No |
| Victory in Europe Day | Saturday 8 May | No |
| Ascension | Thursday 6 May | Yes |
| Whit Monday | 17 May | Yes |
| Bastille Day | Wednesday 14 July | Yes |
| Assumption | Sunday 15 August | No |
| All Saints' Day | Monday 1 November | Yes |
| Armistice Day | Thursday 11 November | Yes |
| Christmas Day | Saturday 25 December | No |
That is seven weekday holidays out of eleven in metropolitan France. In Alsace-Moselle, Good Friday (26 March) adds one, while St Stephen's Day falls on a Sunday, giving eight. Annual capacity plans built on a fixed assumption of eleven days off will understate available working days in a year like 2027.
What to do next
- Separate staff in Bas-Rhin, Haut-Rhin and Moselle onto the Alsace-Moselle calendar.
- Find out from your collective agreement which holidays are days off and whether Whit Monday is worked.
- Decide company policy on bridge days early in the year and publish it.
- Check the France holiday calendar and the 2027 French long weekends before setting May deadlines.
- Use the business days calculator for any deadline that crosses May.
