Whit weeks

How it works

Easter moves. Whit Sunday moves with it. Count seven Sundays after Easter Day and you are on Whit Sunday. That Sunday is also fifty days after Easter, which is why the older church name is Pentecost. The week that takes its name from that Sunday is Whit week, or Whitsun week: Whit Sunday itself and the days that follow.

Whitsuntide is the broader stretch. People say “Whit weeks” in the plural when they mean that holiday season rather than one Sunday. No civic month is called Whit. The dates sit inside May or June, depending on Easter.

Whit Monday is the day after Whit Sunday. Whit Tuesday is the day after that. In Britain, Whit Monday was a bank holiday. It was later replaced by the Spring Bank Holiday, which now falls on the last Monday in May and no longer has to sit on the day after Pentecost.

Because Easter can fall from late March into April, Whit Sunday can fall from mid-May into June. The week is not nailed to a month number. Pin Easter first. Then count. Find Easter Day for the year. Count seven Sundays forward. That Sunday is Whit Sunday.

The seven days from that Sunday through the next Saturday are Whit week in the narrow sense. Trinity Sunday is the Sunday after Whit Sunday in Western churches that keep that feast. The white in the name is usually explained as the white robes of people baptised at this feast. Whit Monday and Whit Friday are leftovers of that week, not extra Sundays.

May, June, and a holiday that came unstuck

Whit Sunday in 2025 was 8 June. In 2026 it is 24 May. In 2027 it is 16 May. In 2028 it is 4 June. Those are the seventh Sundays after the Easter dates of those years. The week that follows each Sunday is the Whit week of that year.

A mill or a school that once closed for “Whit week” closed a named week, not a numbered month. If a family still uses the phrase for a late-May holiday, ask whether they mean Pentecost week or the last week of May. In Britain those two used to coincide more often than they do now, because the bank holiday was unhooked from the feast.

If you are planning around church services, Whit Sunday is the feast. If you are planning around a civic day off in England, Wales, or Northern Ireland, look up the Spring Bank Holiday Monday. That is the last Monday in May. It may or may not be the day after Pentecost.

Do not treat Whit week as a second Easter week. Easter week follows Easter. Whit week follows Pentecost. They are seven weeks apart, not neighbours. Whit weeks move because Easter moves. Fix the Sunday, and the week around it will sit still.