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About the Easter countdown
How many days until Easter? This page shows it live: days, hours, minutes and seconds until Easter Sunday, on the clock of your own device. Easter moves every year, so the page works out the date by itself — and shows the Easter dates for this year, next year and the year after.
Choose Western Easter (Catholic and Protestant churches) or Orthodox Easter (Pascha). Spring petals fall across the board, and a line underneath counts the sleeps for children waiting for the Easter bunny.
Features
- Live countdown — days, hours, minutes and seconds to Easter Sunday, updated every second
- Western or Orthodox Easter — both dates worked out with the church rules, for any year
- Easter dates for three years — this year's, next year's and the year after, with the weekday
- Sleeps — how many nights are left before Easter morning
- Falling petals — in soft spring colours (you can turn them off)
- Six styles — Spring meadow, Painted eggs, Easter bunny, Easter lily, Sunrise and Minimal
- Full screen and Keep the screen on — for a classroom, a church hall or the kitchen
How the date of Easter is worked out
Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after March 21. The rule goes back to the Council of Nicaea in the year 325. The church uses its own tables for the "full moon" and keeps March 21 as the fixed start of spring, so the date can be worked out for any year with simple arithmetic.
- Western Easter can fall on any date from March 22 to April 25. This page uses the *Anonymous Gregorian algorithm* (also called the Meeus/Jones/Butcher method) to find it.
- Orthodox Easter uses the same rule on the older Julian calendar. The page works it out with the Julian method, then moves it 13 days onto today's calendar. That puts it between April 4 and May 8 in this century.
Some years both churches celebrate on the same Sunday — 2028 and 2031 are two of them. Other years, Orthodox Easter is one, four or five weeks later.
| Year | Western Easter | Orthodox Easter |
|---|---|---|
| 2026 | Sunday, April 5 | Sunday, April 12 |
| 2027 | Sunday, March 28 | Sunday, May 2 |
| 2028 | Sunday, April 16 | Sunday, April 16 |
| 2029 | Sunday, April 1 | Sunday, April 8 |
| 2030 | Sunday, April 21 | Sunday, April 28 |
| 2031 | Sunday, April 13 | Sunday, April 13 |
| 2032 | Sunday, March 28 | Sunday, May 2 |
The days around Easter
Many other dates move with Easter. Here they are for 2027, when Western Easter is on March 28:
| Day | How it is counted | 2027 |
|---|---|---|
| Ash Wednesday | 46 days before Easter (start of Lent) | February 10 |
| Palm Sunday | 7 days before | March 21 |
| Good Friday | 2 days before | March 26 |
| Easter Sunday | — | March 28 |
| Easter Monday | 1 day after | March 29 |
| Ascension Day | 39 days after (a Thursday) | May 6 |
| Pentecost | 49 days after | May 16 |
Easter traditions and ideas
- Egg hunts — hide eggs in the garden or the house; the countdown tells you how many days you have to plan
- Dyeing eggs — color hard-boiled eggs a day or two before; Orthodox families often dye them red
- The Easter bunny — the idea of an egg-bringing hare came to America with German settlers
- The White House Easter Egg Roll — held on Easter Monday since 1878
- Easter baskets and lilies — fill a basket for the morning, or buy lilies for the table
- Classroom — put the countdown on the board in spring and count the sleeps to the Easter break
How to use it
- Open the page — the countdown starts by itself
- Pick a style: Spring meadow, Painted eggs, Easter bunny, Easter lily, Sunrise or Minimal
- Under Count down to, choose Easter Sunday (Western churches) or Orthodox Easter
- Turn the falling petals and the sound on or off
- Press Full screen to show it on a big screen; press Esc to go back
Frequently asked questions
When is Easter 2027?
Western Easter 2027 is on Sunday, March 28, 2027 — an early Easter. Orthodox Easter 2027 is on Sunday, May 2, 2027.
Why does Easter change every year?
Because it follows the moon. Easter is the first Sunday after the first full moon on or after March 21, and the moon's dates move each year.
When is Orthodox Easter?
Choose "Orthodox Easter" under Count down to. The page counts to it and shows the dates for the next years. It is the same day as Western Easter in some years, and up to five weeks later in others.
What is the earliest and latest date for Easter?
Western Easter is never before March 22 or after April 25. Orthodox Easter falls between April 4 and May 8 in this century.
How many sleeps until Easter?
The line under the countdown shows the sleeps — the nights left before Easter morning. On the night before, it says "Only 1 more sleep".
Does it work in my time zone?
Yes. It uses the clock on your own phone or computer, so it ends at midnight where you are. On Easter Sunday the page says "Happy Easter!" all day.
Related tools
- Valentine's Day Countdown — days until February 14
- Halloween Countdown — days until October 31
- Thanksgiving Countdown — US and Canadian Thanksgiving
- Christmas Countdown — days and sleeps until Christmas
- New Year Countdown — to midnight, with fireworks
- Countdown to Date — count down to the Easter break or any day
- Printable Calendar — mark Easter on a calendar
