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History of the Gregorian Calendar

The Gregorian calendar is the most prevalently used calendar today. Within this calendar, a standard year consists of 365 days with a leap day being introduced to the month of February during a leap year. The months of April, June, September, and November have 30 days, while the rest have 31 days except for February, which has 28 days in a standard year, and 29 in a leap year.

The Julian and Roman Origins

The Gregorian calendar is a reformed version of the Julian calendar, which was itself a modification of the ancient Roman calendar. The ancient Roman calendar was believed to be an observational lunar calendar, based on the cycles of the moon's phases. The Romans were then believed to have adopted a 10-month calendar with 304 days, leaving the remaining 50 or so days as an unorganized winter. This calendar allowed the summer and winter months to become completely misplaced, leading to the adoption of more accurate calendars.

In 46 BC, the calendar was further reformed by Julius Caesar, introducing an algorithm that removed the dependence of calendars from the observation of the new moon. Caesar inserted an additional 10 days into the Republican calendar, making the total number of days in a year 365. He also added the intercalation of a leap day every fourth year, all in an attempt to further synchronize the Roman calendar with the solar year.

The Gregorian Reform

Despite all efforts, the Julian calendar still required further reform, since the calendar drifted with respect to the equinoxes and solstices by approximately 11 minutes per year. By 1582, this resulted in a difference of 10 days from what was expected. Pope Gregory XIII addressed this by essentially skipping 10 days in the date, making the day after October 4, 1582, October 15. An adjustment was also made to the algorithm of the Julian calendar that changed which century years would be considered leap years. Under the Gregorian calendar, century years not divisible by 400 would not be leap years. These changes reduced the error from 1 day in 128 years, to 1 day in 3,030 years with respect to the current value of the mean solar year.

Holidays and Business Days

A holiday is a day that, either by custom or by law, is set aside such that regular activities like going to work or school are suspended, or at least reduced. The term "holiday" can be interpreted differently, depending on the region. In the U.S., paid leave is typically referred to as "vacation," while national, religious, or cultural days off are referred to exclusively as "holiday."

This calculator is mainly geared towards U.S. holidays. For a further level of specificity, federal holidays in the U.S. refer to holidays that have been recognized by the U.S. government; on these days, non-essential federal government offices are closed, and all federal employees receive paid leave. This is not necessarily true in the private sector.

Certain holidays such as New Year's Day are referred to as "fixed holidays," since they fall on the same date every year. Others, such as the birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr., don't have a fixed date, because they occur on a "floating Monday".

2026 U.S. Federal Holidays

2027 U.S. Federal Holidays