Malta Feasts 2026: Complete Guide to Village Festa Dates

Malta’s festa calendar makes Gozo’s look positively restful. Over 60 parish feasts run across the island in 2026, several on the same weekend through the summer peak, in a tradition so central to Maltese life that UNESCO inscribed the festa on its Intangible Cultural Heritage list in 2023. We cover Gozo’s feasts in detail elsewhere; this is the Malta side of the water, with every 2026 date, the feasts worth planning a trip around and the practical bits nobody prints on the posters.

Quick Questions FAQ

Malta Feast Dates 2026

Here is every Malta parish feast in 2026, month by month, with dates from the Archdiocese of Malta’s official calendar. Celebrations usually run over the week before the feast day. Dates can occasionally move, so if you’re planning a trip around one feast, confirm with the parish nearer the time.

January to April

May

June

July

August

September

October to December

Looking for the Gozo dates? All two dozen of them, plus our guides to the individual feasts, are in the Gozo village feasts guide.

The Feasts Worth Planning a Trip Around

Sixty feasts is a calendar, not a plan, so here’s the shortlist.

Santa Marija, 15 August. The one that stops the country. Seven Malta parishes celebrate at once on a public holiday, with Mosta’s celebrations under the great Rotunda dome the most famous single setting. In 2026 it falls on a Saturday, so expect the biggest crowds in years. Book everything early.

Ħal Lija, 6 August. A small village with an outsized reputation: Lija’s aerial fireworks are spoken of the way Qala’s are on Gozo, and the feast of the Transfiguration draws firework devotees from across both islands.

Mqabba, 21 June and 15 August. The Lily feast in June and Santa Marija in August, both backed by Mqabba’s famous fireworks factories, whose displays have won international competitions. If fireworks are the reason you’re coming, this is the village.

Ħamrun’s San Gejtanu, 9 August. Not the prettiest festa but arguably the most passionate: San Gejtanu is famous for the intensity of its marches and the devotion of its rival supporters, and it’s the feast Maltese people tell you to see if you want the tradition undiluted.

L-Imnarja, 29 June. The oldest of them all and the least typical: a public holiday folk festival at Buskett Gardens with an agricultural show, għana singing through the night and rabbit stew as the traditional supper. If your dates line up, don’t miss it.

Birgu, 10 and 30 August. Vittoriosa fits two feasts into three weeks, St Lawrence and St Dominic, both processing through one of the most atmospheric historic cities in the Mediterranean. The setting does for Birgu what the Cittadella does for Victoria’s feasts on Gozo.

Malta or Gozo: Which Feasts to Choose?

Honest answer: both, they do different things. Malta’s feasts are bigger, louder and more numerous, with multiple festas most summer weekends and the pyrotechnic arms race running hotter; Gozo’s are more intimate, easier to reach on foot from a village stay, and (with respect to Malta’s finest) hold the more dramatic settings in the Cittadella and the villages above the cliffs. Ferry logistics favour combining them: several Gozo feast villages sit within a short ride of the Mġarr terminal, and the crossing runs late enough for an evening festa on either island. Our Gozo village feasts guide covers that side in full, feast by feast.

Getting There and Staying

Malta’s buses reach every feast village from Valletta, but festa nights end long after the last reliable service, so plan on Bolt, eCabs or a hire car for the journey home, and expect road closures around every village core on feast weekends; park on the approach and walk in. Basing yourself in Valletta or Sliema gives you the widest reach for feast-hopping.

From February’s St Paul celebrations to December’s Immaculate Conception, there’sa barely a fortnight in the Maltese calendar without a saint on the move somewhere. Pick a weekend between June and September and you’re all but guaranteed a festa; pick from the shortlist above and you’ll see why UNESCO thought the whole tradition worth protecting. And if the crowds of Malta’s peak season sound like hard work, the quieter side of festa life is a ferry ride away in our Gozo village feasts guide, along with our individual guides to Gozo’s biggest feasts.