Philippine holidays in 2026 fall into three legally distinct categories, each with its own pay rules, workforce implications, and planning requirements. For employers managing Filipino teams, the classification is not a technicality: the pay rate for a worked Regular Holiday is materially different from a worked Special Non-Working Day, and those differences compound across a full year of payroll.
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BPOAI Feature / Philippine BPO Industry
Philippine Holidays 2026: Calendar and Pay Rules
The 2026 Philippine holiday calendar covers 10 Regular Holidays and 8 Special Non-Working Days, each with different pay rules. Worked Regular Holidays require 200% pay, while worked Special Non-Working Days pay 130%, and the difference matters for every BPO payroll budget.
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“The National Commission on Muslim Filipinos will recommend to the President the actual dates on which these holidays will respectively fall.”Philippines Presidential Communications Office
- 200%of their daily pay rate
- 100%of their daily wage
- 130%of their regular daily wage
Pay rates sourced from Penbrothers via Proclamation No. 1006, s. 2025; holiday count from Human Resources Online; all retrieved 2026-10-26.
2026 Calendar
The Official 2026 Philippine Holiday Calendar
The calendar is governed by Proclamation No. 1006, s. 2025, which names 10 Regular Holidays for the year:
- January 1 (Thursday): New Year's Day
- April 2 (Thursday): Maundy Thursday
- April 3 (Friday): Good Friday
- April 9 (Thursday): Araw ng Kagitingan (Day of Valor)
- May 1 (Friday): Labor Day
- June 12 (Friday): Independence Day
- August 31 (Monday): National Heroes Day
- November 30 (Monday): Bonifacio Day
- December 25 (Friday): Christmas Day
- December 30 (Wednesday): Rizal Day
Two additional Regular Holidays, Eid'l Fitr and Eid'l Adha, appear on the calendar without fixed dates. They are confirmed by presidential proclamation after the National Commission on Muslim Filipinos makes a formal recommendation based on the Islamic lunar calendar.
WrkPod's holiday calendar, sourced from the Presidential Communications Office, lists 8 Special Non-Working Days for 2026:
- February 17 (Tuesday): Chinese New Year
- April 4 (Saturday): Black Saturday
- August 21 (Friday): Ninoy Aquino Day
- November 1 (Sunday): All Saints' Day
- November 2 (Monday): All Souls' Day
- December 8 (Tuesday): Feast of the Immaculate Conception of Mary
- December 24 (Thursday): Christmas Eve
- December 31 (Thursday): Last Day of the Year
Pay Rules
Three Pay Rules, Not One
Holiday pay in the Philippines is not a single standard. Each tier carries its own obligation, and the three rates are meaningfully different.
Regular Holidays: An employee who does not work on a Regular Holiday is still entitled to 100% of their daily wage, provided they were present or on paid leave the day before the holiday. An employee who does work is entitled to 200% of their daily pay rate. This is mandatory, with no employer discretion.
Special Non-Working Days: The default rule is no work, no pay. An employee who does not work receives nothing unless a company policy or collective bargaining agreement says otherwise. An employee who works receives 130% of their regular daily wage, a 30% premium over base pay.
Special Working Days: These are treated as ordinary workdays for pay purposes. The EDSA People Power Anniversary is one example. Employers should verify which proclamation applies to a specific date before processing payroll, because applying Regular Holiday rates to a Special Working Day will produce an overpayment.
“the proclamation has tasked the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) to issue the implementing guidelines for the proclamation, which is expected to take effect immediately.”Philippines Presidential Communications Office
Long Weekends
Long Weekends That Need Coverage Maps
Several holiday clusters in 2026 create multi-day gaps that are predictable in advance and manageable when planned early.
April is the most concentrated. Maundy Thursday (April 2), Good Friday (April 3), and Black Saturday (April 4) run through a weekend into Araw ng Kagitingan on April 9. Employees who take the intervening weekdays off can be absent for an extended stretch with only a few days of personal leave. BPO clients depending on Philippine teams for Holy Week coverage should set minimum-staffing requirements before the end of the first quarter.
The year-end stretch is longer. John Jonas notes that the December window runs from December 28 (Saturday) through January 1, anchored by Rizal Day on December 30 (Wednesday) and the Last Day of the Year on December 31 (Thursday). With Christmas falling on a Friday in 2026, employees who take a few days of leave in late December can be absent for a significant portion of the month's final two weeks. Service agreements covering the year-end period should specify minimum staffing thresholds explicitly, not just reference the holiday list.
November brings a smaller cluster. All Saints' Day (November 1, Sunday) and All Souls' Day (November 2, Monday) create a three-day weekend that coincides with a traditional period for Filipinos to travel home. Availability on the surrounding workdays may also be reduced, particularly for staff with family outside Metro Manila.
Islamic Holidays
Islamic Holidays: Confirmed Late, Required Early
Eid'l Fitr and Eid'l Adha are Regular Holidays in the Philippines, which means every Regular Holiday pay obligation applies. The practical complication is timing: their dates are not set in the initial proclamation.
"The National Commission on Muslim Filipinos will recommend to the President the actual dates on which these holidays will respectively fall." Philippines Presidential Communications Office
A presidential proclamation follows the NCMF recommendation, and DOLE then issues implementing guidelines. The Presidential Communications Office has stated that "the proclamation has tasked the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) to issue the implementing guidelines for the proclamation, which is expected to take effect immediately."
For payroll teams, this means two budget lines without confirmed dates must be carried through the early months of the year. Contracts that list a fixed set of Philippine holidays without referring to the annual proclamation cycle may not clearly cover these two days when they are confirmed. Use proclamation references rather than static date lists in outsourcing agreements.
BPO Planning
What This Means for BPO Workforce Planning
The Philippines counted 18 public holidays in 2025, and the 2026 structure follows a similar pattern. For companies managing outsourced teams in the country, three planning areas stand out.
Payroll compliance: A payroll system that applies a single holiday rate across all declared Philippine holidays will misprice the 8 Special Non-Working Days in the 2026 calendar. The gap between worked Regular Holiday pay (200%) and worked Special Non-Working Day pay (130%) is wide enough to produce material budget variance across a large team. Audit your payroll classification table against Proclamation No. 1006, s. 2025 before the first payroll cycle of the year.
Leave coverage: The April Holy Week cluster and the December-January window will generate the most simultaneous leave requests in 2026. Document minimum-staffing thresholds for both periods in your service agreements, not just in internal HR policies. Internal policies can be revised without notice; contractual minimums are binding.
Contract structure: Enumerate holiday obligations by reference to the applicable presidential proclamation, not by a fixed list of dates. This keeps the contract current when Islamic holiday dates are confirmed mid-year and prevents disputes over whether a newly proclaimed holiday falls within scope.
To find Philippine BPO providers with transparent holiday and staffing policies, browse the BPO directory.
Further reading
Browse Philippine BPO providers with transparent holiday and staffing policies in the BPOAI.ai directory.Browse BPO Directory
9Sources and methodologyEvery figure on this page carries a source URL, retrieval date, and confidence score
All holiday dates are drawn from Proclamation No. 1006, s. 2025, accessed through penbrothers.com and WrkPod, both of which cite the Philippine Presidential Communications Office as their primary source; pay rate figures come from penbrothers.com's guide to DOLE labor regulations; Islamic holiday process information comes from Human Resources Online quoting the Presidential Communications Office directly. All pages were retrieved on 2026-10-26. Confidence scores follow a tiered scheme: official government proclamation data cited by third parties rates 0.88 to 0.90; third-party aggregations of labor law rate 0.85; editorial or advisory sources rate 0.75.
- 0110 Regular HolidaysPenbrothers (citing Proclamation No. 1006, s. 2025) · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.90
- 028 Special Non-Working Days for 2026WrkPod Holiday Calendar (citing Presidential Communications Office) · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.88
- 03100% of their daily wagePenbrothers Philippine Holiday Guide · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.85
- 04200% of their daily pay ratePenbrothers Philippine Holiday Guide · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.85
- 05130% of their regular daily wagePenbrothers Philippine Holiday Guide · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.85
- 0618 public holidays in 2025Human Resources Online · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.82
- 07The National Commission on Muslim Filipinos will recommend to the President the actual dates on which these holidays will respectively fall.Human Resources Online (quoting Philippines Presidential Communications Office) · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.90
- 08the proclamation has tasked the Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) to issue the implementing guidelines for the proclamation, which is expected to take effect immediately.Human Resources Online (quoting Philippines Presidential Communications Office) · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.90
- 09December 28 (Saturday) through January 1John Jonas — Upcoming Philippines Holidays · retrieved 2026-10-26 · confidence 0.75
Confidence scale: 0.90–0.98 registry or official data, 0.75–0.89 third-party aggregated, 0.50–0.74 self-attested. Figures that could not be sourced were removed rather than published.
