Public Holidays: How to Update Your Restaurant Opening Hours (2027)

Thanksgiving falls on Thursday, November 25 in 2027. Twenty-eight of your thirty locations are open with a limited menu. Two are closed. Nobody updated the listings. Google now displays "hours might differ" across your entire network, guests hesitate, and you lose covers on one of the most profitable days of the year.

Holiday hours are one of the most expensive blind spots in multi-unit hospitality. Not because the task is hard, but because it is tedious: multiplied by every location, every platform, and roughly a dozen holidays a year.

This guide covers the four questions that matter: why it is critical, when to act, which platforms to update and the trap hiding in each one, and how to stop losing entire evenings to it. With the full 2027 calendar for the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom.

Why holiday hours matter more than you think

If you confirm nothing, Google casts doubt for you

This is the mechanism most groups miss. Ahead of a public holiday, Google does not assume you are open as usual. If you have neither changed your hours nor confirmed they remain the same, your listing displays a warning along the lines of "hours might differ."

This is not interpretation. Google's own documentation recommends confirming your hours for official holidays even when they are identical to your regular hours, precisely to clear that doubt.

That warning does two kinds of damage at once: it deters the guest at the exact moment of decision, and it signals to the algorithm that your listing is unreliable.

Doing nothing is not neutral. Doing nothing actively degrades your listing.

The real cost is measured in lost covers

Two symmetrical scenarios, both expensive:

• You close, the listing says open. The guest travels and finds locked doors. You do not just lose a cover — you earn a negative review, and reviews weigh on your rating and visibility for a long time.
• You open, the listing says closed or stays ambiguous. The guest never leaves home. You lose the cover without ever knowing it existed. This is the more common case, and the more invisible one.

The second is the genuine danger: it shows up in no dashboard. Nobody ever reports the guest who did not come.

Inconsistency across platforms is penalised mechanically

Your guests do not only search on Google. They go through OpenTable, Yelp, TripAdvisor, delivery apps and Apple Maps. When your hours differ from one platform to the next, Google detects the inconsistency and favours businesses that look more reliable than yours.

Apple states it outright in its documentation: the hours shown on your Place Card should match the hours published on your official website. Consistency is not a nice-to-have, it is an explicit platform expectation.

When to act: what the platforms actually require

A common assumption says you should start early because platforms are slow to propagate changes. That is wrong in most cases. Deliveroo lets you create events as far ahead as you like, Uber Eats applies changes immediately, and Google usually publishes within minutes.

The real constraints sit elsewhere, and there are three of them:

• Google puts your edits through review. Its documentation cites roughly ten minutes as typical, but the process can stretch to 30 days. Your edit can sit in a pending state, or be rejected outright, without anyone telling you.
• Apple reviews every change. Expect a few days, varying with the nature of the edit.
• Bing Places is by far the slowest. The delay reported by Bing support for special hours to appear on the live listing is 7 to 10 business days. This is the platform that sets your timeline.

The risk is not slow propagation. It is the change that fails silently — rejected by Google, stuck at Apple, not yet live on Bing — with nobody checking.

The countdown

• D-21 — Bing Places, the slowest platform. Handle it first, not last.
• D-14 — every other platform, for every affected location, including those changing nothing. Confirmation counts as much as modification.
• D-7 — verification. Open each listing as a guest would, not from the back office, and check what actually displays. This is where you catch rejected or pending edits.
• D-2 — publish a Google post restating your holiday hours. It is free, it reassures guests, and it feeds your local SEO.
• D+1 — restore standard hours if you changed them. Essential on platforms with no dedicated field (see below).

The underlying habit: block twenty minutes at the start of each week to review the next three weeks. A holiday caught at D-21 costs minutes. Caught the day before, it costs a service.

2027 public holiday calendar

The dates below are national or federal. All three countries carry significant regional variation, flagged country by country with the official source to check for your specific locations.

United States — 11 federal holidays

Three holidays fall on a weekend in 2027, which shifts the observed date. Under federal rules, a Saturday holiday is observed the preceding Friday and a Sunday holiday the following Monday.

• Friday, January 1 — New Year's Day
• Monday, January 18 — Martin Luther King, Jr. Day
• Monday, February 15 — Washington's Birthday (Presidents' Day)
• Monday, May 31 — Memorial Day
• Saturday, June 19 — Juneteenth, observed Friday, June 18
• Sunday, July 4 — Independence Day, observed Monday, July 5
• Monday, September 6 — Labor Day
• Monday, October 11 — Columbus Day / Indigenous Peoples' Day
• Thursday, November 11 — Veterans Day
• Thursday, November 25 — Thanksgiving
• Saturday, December 25 — Christmas Day, observed Friday, December 24

Regional variation: states add their own holidays, and observance differs widely for private employers. Columbus Day in particular is observed inconsistently and is replaced by Indigenous Peoples' Day in a number of states and cities.

Restaurant-specific note: the highest-impact dates for hospitality are not always the federal ones. The day before Thanksgiving, Black Friday, Super Bowl Sunday, Valentine's Day and Mother's Day drive more traffic swings than Columbus Day ever will. They are not holidays, so your standard hours apply — but they deserve a Google post.

Official source: U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM), 5 U.S.C. 6103.

Canada — federal holidays and heavy provincial variation

Federally regulated holidays in 2027. Christmas and Boxing Day both fall on a weekend, shifting observance to the following Monday and Tuesday.

• Friday, January 1 — New Year's Day
• Friday, March 26 — Good Friday
• Monday, March 29 — Easter Monday
• Monday, May 24 — Victoria Day
• Thursday, July 1 — Canada Day
• Monday, September 6 — Labour Day
• Thursday, September 30 — National Day for Truth and Reconciliation
• Monday, October 11 — Thanksgiving
• Thursday, November 11 — Remembrance Day
• Saturday, December 25 — Christmas Day, observed Monday, December 27
• Sunday, December 26 — Boxing Day, observed Tuesday, December 28

Provincial variation is the rule, not the exception:

• Monday, February 15 — Family Day in Alberta, British Columbia, New Brunswick, Ontario and Saskatchewan; Louis Riel Day in Manitoba; Nova Scotia Heritage Day; Islander Day in PEI. Not a federal holiday.
• Monday, August 2 — Civic Holiday, under a different name in almost every province: British Columbia Day, Saskatchewan Day, New Brunswick Day, Natal Day in Nova Scotia, Terry Fox Day in Manitoba.
• Québec runs a distinct calendar: National Patriots' Day on Monday, May 24 and the Fête nationale du Québec on Thursday, June 24 — the single most important date for a Montréal operation. Remembrance Day is not a statutory holiday there.
• Remembrance Day is statutory for federally regulated employers but not in Ontario or Québec.

Official source: Canada.ca, plus the relevant provincial labour standards authority.

United Kingdom — three different calendars

There is no single UK bank holiday list. England and Wales have 8 in 2027, Scotland has 9, Northern Ireland has 10. Christmas Day and Boxing Day both fall on a weekend, so substitute days apply everywhere.

England and Wales — 8 bank holidays

• Friday, January 1 — New Year's Day
• Friday, March 26 — Good Friday
• Monday, March 29 — Easter Monday
• Monday, May 3 — Early May bank holiday
• Monday, May 31 — Spring bank holiday
• Monday, August 30 — Summer bank holiday
• Monday, December 27 — Christmas Day (substitute day)
• Tuesday, December 28 — Boxing Day (substitute day)

Scotland — 9 bank holidays

• Friday, January 1 — New Year's Day
• Monday, January 4 — 2 January (substitute day)
• Friday, March 26 — Good Friday
• Monday, May 3 — Early May bank holiday
• Monday, May 31 — Spring bank holiday
• Monday, August 2 — Summer bank holiday
• Tuesday, November 30 — St Andrew's Day
• Monday, December 27 — Christmas Day (substitute day)
• Tuesday, December 28 — Boxing Day (substitute day)

Two traps here. Scotland does not observe Easter Monday, and its summer bank holiday falls on the first Monday of August rather than the last — nearly four weeks before England and Wales. If you operate in both Edinburgh and London, these are two separate operational dates.

Northern Ireland — 10 bank holidays

• Friday, January 1 — New Year's Day
• Wednesday, March 17 — St Patrick's Day
• Friday, March 26 — Good Friday
• Monday, March 29 — Easter Monday
• Monday, May 3 — Early May bank holiday
• Monday, May 31 — Spring bank holiday
• Monday, July 12 — Battle of the Boyne (Orangemen's Day)
• Monday, August 30 — Summer bank holiday
• Monday, December 27 — Christmas Day (substitute day)
• Tuesday, December 28 — Boxing Day (substitute day)

Official sources: GOV.UK for England, Wales and Scotland; nidirect for Northern Ireland.

Remaining 2026 dates

If you are reading this in 2026, here is what is still ahead:

• Monday, August 31 — Summer bank holiday (England, Wales, Northern Ireland)
• Monday, September 7 — Labor Day (US) and Labour Day (Canada)
• Wednesday, September 30 — National Day for Truth and Reconciliation (Canada)
• Monday, October 12 — Columbus Day (US) and Thanksgiving (Canada)
• Wednesday, November 11 — Veterans Day (US), Remembrance Day (Canada)
• Thursday, November 26 — Thanksgiving (US), followed by Black Friday
• Monday, November 30 — St Andrew's Day (Scotland)
• Friday, December 25 — Christmas Day, with Boxing Day substitute on Monday, December 28 in the UK

Which platforms to update, and the trap in each

The most common mistake is updating Google and calling it done. Google is the most visible, not the only one consulted. And every platform has its own logic, its own vocabulary and its own limits — which is exactly where multi-unit groups come unstuck.

Google Business Profile

Where: Edit profile → Hours → Special hours. Google often suggests upcoming dates, so you can simply review and confirm them.

⚠️ The trap: special hours only cover a closure of six consecutive days maximum. Beyond seven days in a row, Google requires you to switch the location to "Temporarily closed" instead. For any group that shuts a site for a refurbishment or a seasonal break, this matters: a two-week closure handled through special hours will produce an inconsistent result.

Timing: usually minutes, but watch the status of the edit — accepted, not approved, or pending.

Apple Business Connect

⚠️ The trap, and it wastes an enormous amount of time: in Apple Business Connect, the "Special hours" field is not for public holidays. It exists for special services, such as a drive-through open later than the dining room. For a holiday or a closure, the field you need is "Temporary hours", with a start and end date. Many operators look in the wrong place and conclude the feature does not exist.

Timing: Apple reviews every change before it goes live. Expect a few days.

Yelp

Where: Yelp for Business → Business Information → Add special hours. Yelp suggests upcoming holidays and lets you add custom dates.

⚠️ The trap: special hours are set day by day, with no date ranges. A four-day weekend means four separate entries. Once saved, they appear under "Upcoming special hours" in your account, and a note is displayed at the top of your public page.

Bing Places

Where: bingplaces.com → your business → Edit → tick the option to provide working hours for special days.

⚠️ The trap: this is the slowest platform of the lot, with a reported delay of 7 to 10 business days before the change appears publicly. Do this one first. On the upside, Bing highlights special hours in green on the listing, which makes them very legible. Bing also matters more than its market share suggests because of its role in some AI answers — see our guide to GEO for restaurants.

Uber Eats

Where: Uber Eats Manager → Settings → Holiday Hours. Add a date, then indicate whether the store is closed all day or simply operating shortened or extended hours.

Worth knowing: changes apply immediately, and Uber exposes a dedicated holiday hours API — useful if you want to automate across a large estate.

Deliveroo

Where: Hub → Opening Hours → Edit availability. The tool lets you create named events as far ahead as you like and apply them to multiple sites in a single operation — the best multi-location handling among the delivery platforms.

⚠️ Two traps: a full-day closure does not go through special hours but through "days off", a separate setting. And only admin users can change these hours, so if your site managers do not hold that permission, the task cannot be delegated.

Facebook and Instagram

⚠️ The trap: Meta offers no full equivalent of special hours. There is a temporary service changes option, but for a straightforward public holiday you will often have to edit your regular hours and then remember to change them back. This is the platform where the D+1 step gets forgotten most often. Stories remain the fastest channel for announcing a last-minute change.

Reservation platforms and the rest

OpenTable, Resy, SevenRooms, TheFork, TripAdvisor, DoorDash and Just Eat all follow the same logic: a dedicated exceptions field, to be set before the holiday and verified from the guest side. Two things to check for each one:

• Whether a full-day closure uses the same setting as an hours change. It rarely does.
• Whether the setting is available on mobile. Several reservation tools only expose it on desktop, which is a nasty surprise for a manager trying to fix it from a phone the night before.

The verification that actually works: after saving, open your public booking widget, refresh it, and run a dummy reservation on the holiday date. Back-office confirmation is not proof that a guest sees the right answer.

For a 20-location group across 8 platforms, a single public holiday means 160 updates, each with its own rules. That is the point where this stops being a best practice and becomes an operations problem.

How to stop losing time on holiday hours

Done by hand, one public holiday across 20 restaurants and 8 platforms easily consumes half a day — and still leaves gaps, because nobody ticks 160 boxes without missing some, let alone while juggling eight different vocabularies.

With Malou, the logic inverts: you enter special hours once and they propagate across every platform where your locations exist. Three things change:

• One entry, every platform. Special hours are set in a single place and distributed everywhere, which removes the inconsistency risk mechanically — and spares you having to memorise each platform's terminology.
• Bulk multi-location updates. Apply the same change to a group of restaurants without going listing by listing, while keeping control over exceptions.
• Pre-holiday verification. The dashboard lets you audit hours across the network and spot locations that have confirmed nothing — the ones Google is about to flag.

That is time returned to your teams, but above all revenue that is no longer lost by default on a high-traffic day. Reviews follow the same logic — see our guide to restaurant review management.

Want to know where you stand? Scan your locations for free and get your visibility score, detected inconsistencies and tailored recommendations.

FAQ: holiday opening hours

Do I need to update Google hours if my restaurant keeps normal hours on a holiday?

Yes. You must explicitly confirm your hours even when unchanged — Google's own documentation recommends it. Without confirmation, your listing displays "hours might differ," which deters guests and undermines the perceived reliability of your business. Confirming counts as much as changing.

How far ahead should holiday hours be updated?

Twenty-one days for Bing Places, whose reported publication delay reaches 7 to 10 business days, and fourteen days for everything else. Most platforms publish within minutes: this lead time is not propagation, it is a margin to catch edits that were rejected or left pending.

Can Google special hours be used for an extended closure?

No. Special hours are capped at six consecutive days. For a closure of seven days or more — a refurbishment or a seasonal break — you need to switch the location to "Temporarily closed" and reactivate it on reopening.

Why can't I find holiday hours in Apple Business Connect?

Because they are not where you would look. In Apple Business Connect, "Special hours" covers special services, not holidays. For a public holiday or closure, use "Temporary hours" and set a start and end date.

Which platforms should be updated first?

Bing Places first because of its lead time, then Google Business Profile and your own website, then reservation and delivery platforms, where an hours error translates directly into bookings or orders you cannot honour.

Are UK bank holidays the same across the whole United Kingdom?

No. England and Wales have 8 bank holidays in 2027, Scotland has 9 and Northern Ireland has 10. Scotland does not observe Easter Monday and takes its summer bank holiday on the first Monday of August rather than the last.

What happens when a US federal holiday falls on a weekend?

The observed date shifts: a Saturday holiday is observed the preceding Friday, a Sunday holiday the following Monday. In 2027 this affects Juneteenth, Independence Day and Christmas Day. Your guests, however, celebrate on the actual date — so plan hours around both.