Statutory Holidays in Ontario (2026): The 9 Public Holidays, Who Qualifies and How Holiday Pay Works

Ontario has nine statutory holidays — the Employment Standards Act calls them public holidays — and getting them wrong is one of the most common reasons for wage claims against small employers. The rules aren't hard, but they have several branches: whether the holiday falls on a working day, whether the employee works it, whether they qualify, and how their pay is calculated. This guide is for Ontario employers, payroll staff and employees in 2026. It lists the holidays with their dates for 2026 and 2027, explains who qualifies, walks through the public holiday pay formula, sets out the options when someone works a holiday, and gives worked examples in Canadian dollars.

Quick answer

Ontario has 9 public holidays: New Year's Day, Family Day, Good Friday, Victoria Day, Canada Day, Labour Day, Thanksgiving, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Eligible employees get the day off with public holiday pay — four weeks of regular wages plus vacation pay, divided by 20. Anyone who works the holiday gets either premium pay of 1½ times the regular rate plus holiday pay, or regular pay plus a paid substitute day.

• Not public holidays: Easter Monday, the August Civic Holiday, Remembrance Day

• Full-time, part-time, casual and brand-new employees all qualify

• Miss the last scheduled shift before or first after without reasonable cause and you lose holiday pay

• Substitute days must be given within 3 months (12 months with written agreement)

• In 2026, Boxing Day is a Saturday — most weekday staff are owed a substitute day

Ontario's public holidays: dates for 2026 and 2027

The list of holidays comes from Ontario's Employment Standards Act guide; the dates are calculated from the rules for each holiday. Easter Sunday, Easter Monday, the first Monday in August and Remembrance Day are not public holidays under the Act. Your employment contract or collective agreement can give more holidays — and if it does, the contract decides how they're paid.

Note the weekend clashes. Boxing Day 2026 is a Saturday, and in 2027 both Christmas Day and Boxing Day fall on a weekend. For employees who work Monday to Friday, those holidays fall on a day they wouldn't ordinarily work, which triggers the substitute-day rules explained below. Announce the substitute days well in advance — for example, Monday, 28 December 2026 — so staff can plan around them.

The Civic Holiday and other days that aren't on the list

The first Monday in August is the most common source of confusion. It goes by Simcoe Day in Toronto, and by other local names elsewhere, and many municipalities, banks and offices close. But it isn't a public holiday under the Employment Standards Act, so employers don't have to give the day off or pay public holiday pay for it. The same goes for Remembrance Day on 11 November, which is a holiday for federally regulated employers but not under Ontario's Act, and Easter Monday.

Federally regulated employers in Ontario

Banks, airlines, interprovincial trucking companies, telecoms and other federally regulated employers in Ontario follow the Canada Labour Code, not the Employment Standards Act. The Code has 10 general holidays: New Year's Day, Good Friday, Victoria Day, Canada Day, Labour Day, the National Day for Truth and Reconciliation (30 September), Thanksgiving, Remembrance Day, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Family Day is not on the federal list. Federal holiday pay is also one-twentieth of four weeks' wages, but excluding overtime, and working a holiday earns at least 1.5 times the regular rate plus holiday pay.

Who qualifies for public holiday pay

Almost every employee covered by the Employment Standards Act is entitled to public holidays — full-time, part-time, permanent, term, casual and student employees alike. There is no minimum length of service: someone hired the week before Canada Day is entitled to it.

There is one condition. To qualify for public holiday pay, the employee must work their last regularly scheduled day of work before the holiday and their first regularly scheduled day after it, unless they have reasonable cause for missing either. Reasonable cause means something beyond the employee's control, such as illness, and it's up to the employee to show it. Someone who skips the Friday before a long weekend to extend it, without reasonable cause, loses public holiday pay for the Monday.

An employee who doesn't qualify isn't simply ignored. If they work on the holiday, they're still entitled to premium pay of 1½ times the regular rate for the hours they work.

Some jobs are exempt from the public holiday rules altogether, or have special rules. Ontario's guide uses the example of a taxi driver, whose work is exempt, while a taxi dispatcher's is covered. If an employee does both kinds of work, they qualify for that week if at least half their work is covered. Check Ontario's special rules and exemptions tool for your industry.

How public holiday pay is calculated

Public holiday pay in Ontario follows one formula:

Ontario public holiday pay formula

1. 1

   Find the four work weeks before the holiday

   Count back four complete work weeks from the start of the work week in which the holiday falls.

2. 2

   Add up regular wages

   Include the regular wages earned in those weeks. Leave out overtime pay, vacation pay, public holiday pay, premium pay, termination and severance pay.

3. 3

   Add vacation pay payable for those weeks

   If you pay 4% vacation pay on each cheque, or the employee took vacation in the period, add the vacation pay payable on those wages.

4. 4

   Divide by 20

   The result is the public holiday pay for one holiday. Pay it on the regular pay day for the period that includes the holiday.

Because the divisor is fixed at 20 — the number of working days in four five-day weeks — a full-time employee working five days a week gets roughly one normal day's pay, and a part-timer gets proportionally less. That's by design. There's no separate rule for part-time staff.

Worked examples

Full-time, five days a week. Ontario's own example: an employee who earns C$120 a day and works five days a week, with no vacation in the period, has C$2,400 in regular wages over four weeks. C$2,400 ÷ 20 = C$120 in public holiday pay. An hourly employee on C$20 an hour working 40-hour weeks earns C$3,200 over four weeks, so their holiday pay is C$160.

Part-time, three days a week, with vacation pay on each cheque. Tegan works three days a week at C$120 a day: C$1,440 over four weeks, plus 4% vacation pay of C$57.60. C$1,497.60 ÷ 20 = C$74.88.

Variable hours. Bertie's hours change every week. Her regular wages over the four weeks total C$1,500, plus C$60 vacation pay paid on each cheque. C$1,560 ÷ 20 = C$78.

Overtime in the four weeks. A warehouse worker earned C$3,200 in regular wages and C$450 in overtime in the four weeks before Labour Day. The overtime is left out, so holiday pay is C$3,200 ÷ 20 = C$160.

Public holiday pay itself counts toward vacation pay in Ontario — it's part of the wages on which the 4% or 6% is calculated. See our vacation pay guide for the full list of what counts.

If the holiday falls on a working day

Most of the time, the holiday falls on a day the employee would normally work. They get the day off and are paid public holiday pay. That's the default, and it requires nothing from the employee except meeting the last-and-first rule.

Take a retail supervisor who works Monday to Friday and is scheduled as usual around Victoria Day. She works Friday, 15 May and Tuesday, 19 May 2026, so she qualifies, and Monday, 18 May is a paid day off. If she had called in sick on the Tuesday with a doctor's note, she would still qualify, because illness is reasonable cause. If she had simply not turned up, she would lose the holiday pay but the day would still be a day off.

Holiday pay that has been earned but not yet paid or taken — for example, a substitute day that hasn't been scheduled yet — doesn't disappear when the job ends. Ontario's guide says it must be paid with the employee's final wages, and the amount goes on the Record of Employment as statutory holiday pay.

If the employee works on a public holiday

An employer can't require most employees to work on a public holiday that falls on a working day; the employee has to agree, in writing or electronically. Once they agree, there are two options:

Two ways to pay for working a public holiday

	Option 1: substitute day	Option 2: premium pay
On the holiday	Regular wages for the hours worked	Premium pay (1½ times the regular rate) for hours worked
Plus	A substitute day off with public holiday pay	Public holiday pay for the day
Substitute day	Within 3 months, or 12 months with written agreement	None
Who chooses	Employee (by agreement); employer in special industries	Employee (by agreement); employer in special industries

On the holiday

Option 1: substitute day

Regular wages for the hours worked

Option 2: premium pay

Premium pay (1½ times the regular rate) for hours worked

Plus

Option 1: substitute day

A substitute day off with public holiday pay

Option 2: premium pay

Public holiday pay for the day

Substitute day

Option 1: substitute day

Within 3 months, or 12 months with written agreement

Option 2: premium pay

None

Who chooses

Option 1: substitute day

Employee (by agreement); employer in special industries

Option 2: premium pay

Employee (by agreement); employer in special industries

Special industries. Employers in hotels, motels, tourist resorts, restaurants, taverns, hospitals and nursing homes, and continuous operations, can require employees to work a holiday that falls on a normal working day, unless the employee is on vacation. In that case the employer chooses which of the two options applies. Rights under the Ontario Human Rights Code — for example, religious observance — still apply. Some retail employees in continuous operations, such as a 24-hour convenience store, have a right to refuse public holiday work; Ontario's retail workers chapter sets out the details.

Example — premium pay. Nathan earns C$20 an hour. His premium pay rate is C$30 an hour (C$20 × 1½). If he works eight hours on Thanksgiving and chose option 2, he gets C$240 in premium pay plus his public holiday pay — C$160 if he's a full-timer on 40-hour weeks — for C$400 in total for the day.

Example — substitute day. If Nathan chose option 1 instead, he'd get C$160 in regular wages for working Thanksgiving, plus a paid substitute day off — worth another C$160 of public holiday pay — scheduled within three months.

Example — minimum wage. A café employee on Ontario's C$17.95 an hour general minimum wage who works Christmas Day under option 2 is owed at least C$26.93 an hour in premium pay, plus public holiday pay.

If the employee agrees to work but doesn't show up

An employee who agreed to work the holiday and doesn't turn up, without reasonable cause, loses both public holiday pay and any substitute day. With reasonable cause, it depends on the option they chose: under option 1, they still get a substitute day off with public holiday pay; under option 2, they get public holiday pay but no premium pay, since they didn't work. If they work only some of the agreed hours without reasonable cause, they're paid premium pay for the hours worked and lose the holiday pay and substitute day.

If the holiday falls on a day off or during vacation

When a public holiday lands on a day the employee wouldn't ordinarily work — a weekend for office staff, or a Wednesday for someone who works Thursday to Monday — they're entitled to a substitute day off with public holiday pay. Alternatively, if they agree in writing or electronically, they can simply receive public holiday pay for the day with no substitute day off.

The same two options apply when the holiday falls during the employee's vacation. The day still counts as a vacation day, and the employee gets either a substitute day or holiday pay on top.

Example — Boxing Day 2026. A Monday-to-Friday bookkeeper in Ottawa earns C$1,000 a week. Boxing Day falls on Saturday, 26 December 2026. Her employer designates Monday, 28 December as the substitute holiday and pays C$200 in public holiday pay for it (C$4,000 ÷ 20). If she prefers to work that Monday, she can agree in writing to take C$200 of holiday pay instead of the day off, and is paid normally for the Monday as well.

Whenever a substitute day is given, the employer must give the employee a written statement about it before the holiday, so there's no dispute later about which day replaced which. The substitute day must fall within 3 months of the holiday, or within 12 months if the employee agrees in writing or electronically.

Public holidays and overtime

Ontario calculates overtime after 44 hours in a work week, and public holidays interact with it in two ways. Hours paid at premium pay for working a holiday are excluded when counting hours toward overtime, unless the employee chose option 1 and took a substitute day. And public holiday pay and overtime pay are calculated separately — one never replaces the other. Our guide to overtime pay in Canada covers the 44-hour rule, averaging and time off in lieu.

For payroll deductions, public holiday pay in a pay period is treated like regular salary: the CRA says to calculate income tax, CPP and EI as you would for regular pay. See payroll deductions in Canada for the 2026 rates.

Common mistakes Ontario employers make

Treating the Civic Holiday as a statutory holiday — or, the reverse, failing to pay for Family Day, which federal employers don't get but Ontario employees do.

Paying a flat eight hours. The formula is based on the previous four weeks' earnings, not on a standard day. Paying everyone eight hours overpays part-timers and can underpay full-timers on longer shifts.

Forgetting vacation pay in the formula. If you pay 4% vacation pay on each cheque, it goes into the four-week total. Leaving it out underpays every holiday.

No written agreement or statement. Holiday work and substitute days both depend on written or electronic agreements and, for substitute days, a written statement before the holiday. Keep them with your payroll records.

Missing weekend holidays. When a holiday falls on a Saturday or Sunday, office staff are still owed a substitute day or holiday pay.

Before each public holiday

0/7

• Check who is scheduled the last day before and first day after
• Get written agreements from anyone working the holiday, recording which option they chose
• Schedule and give written notice of any substitute days
• Pull four weeks of regular wages plus vacation pay for each employee
• Divide by 20 and add the line to the pay run
• Pay premium pay for hours worked under option 2
• Leave premium-pay hours out of the overtime count

Share Print

Official links

• Ontario — public holidays (ESA guide)The 9 holidays, formula and options
• Ontario — overtime payHow holidays interact with overtime
• Ontario — vacationHolidays during vacation
• Federal — vacations and general holidays10 holidays for federally regulated employers
• CRA — vacation pay and public holiday paymentsPayroll deductions

What to do next

Put the 2026 and 2027 holiday dates into your payroll calendar now, decide your substitute days for the weekend holidays at Christmas, and set up the 1/20 calculation in your payroll software so it picks up vacation pay. Then check your vacation pay setup, since public holiday pay feeds into it, and issue clear pay stubs showing holiday and premium pay as separate lines with our salary slip generator.

This is general information, not legal or tax advice — confirm on the official source or with a professional.

Frequently asked questions

How many statutory holidays are there in Ontario?

Ontario's Employment Standards Act has 9 public holidays: New Year's Day, Family Day, Good Friday, Victoria Day, Canada Day, Labour Day, Thanksgiving Day, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Easter Monday, the August Civic Holiday and Remembrance Day aren't public holidays under the Act, though some employers give them by contract.

Is the Civic Holiday in August a stat holiday in Ontario?

No. The first Monday in August — called Simcoe Day in Toronto and other names elsewhere — isn't a public holiday under Ontario's Employment Standards Act. Employers don't have to give the day off or pay public holiday pay unless an employment contract, policy or collective agreement says so. Many offices and governments close, which is why it's often mistaken for one.

How is public holiday pay calculated in Ontario?

Add the regular wages the employee earned in the four work weeks before the work week of the holiday, plus the vacation pay payable on those wages, and divide by 20. A full-timer earning C$160 a day five days a week gets C$160. Regular wages exclude overtime, vacation pay, public holiday pay and premium pay.

What do I get paid for working on a stat holiday in Ontario?

If you agree to work, you choose (in writing or electronically) either your regular wages plus a substitute day off with public holiday pay, or public holiday pay plus premium pay of 1½ times the regular rate for the hours worked. Hotels, restaurants, hospitals and continuous operations can require holiday work, and then the employer picks the option.

Do part-time employees get stat holiday pay in Ontario?

Yes. Part-time, casual, temporary and new employees qualify on the same terms as full-timers, with no minimum length of service. Because the formula divides four weeks of wages by 20, a part-timer's holiday pay is smaller — Ontario's example of a three-day-a-week employee earning C$120 a day gives C$74.88 with vacation pay included.

What happens when a stat holiday falls on a weekend in Ontario?

If it falls on a day the employee doesn't normally work, they get a substitute day off with public holiday pay, or public holiday pay with no day off if they agree in writing or electronically. In 2026, Boxing Day falls on Saturday, 26 December, so most Monday-to-Friday staff are owed a substitute day.

Sources & verification

Figures on this page were checked against the sources below when it was last reviewed on 12 October 2026. Each rate and limit is stored once with its own official source and review date, and official update channels are monitored daily so changes are picked up. How we verify

1. 1.Your guide to the Employment Standards Act: Public holidays — Government of Ontario · accessed 12 October 2026
2. 2.Your guide to the Employment Standards Act: Overtime pay — Government of Ontario · accessed 12 October 2026
3. 3.Your guide to the Employment Standards Act: Vacation — Government of Ontario · accessed 12 October 2026
4. 4.Annual vacations and general holidays (federally regulated employers) — Employment and Social Development Canada · accessed 12 October 2026
5. 5.Vacation pay and public holiday payments — Canada Revenue Agency · accessed 12 October 2026
6. 6.Your guide to the Employment Standards Act: Minimum wage — Government of Ontario · accessed 12 October 2026