Dashain 2026 tika is Wednesday 21 October, here are all fifteen days and the Tihar dates

Ask anyone in Kathmandu when Dashain is and they answer with the tika day first, because that is the day everything else bends around — the flight home, the shuttered bank, the queue at the bus counter. In 2026 that day is Wednesday 21 October. Dashain runs from Ghatasthapana on Sunday 11 October to Kojagrat Purnima on Sunday 25 October. Tihar follows three weeks later, 7–11 November, closing with Bhai Tika on Wednesday 11 November.

Both are lunar festivals, so the dates move every year and a calendar printed for Delhi or Sydney will not always agree with one printed for Kathmandu. Every date on this page is taken from the panchang calculated for Kathmandu (27°42′N, 85°19′E) and cross-checked against the Nepali patro, because a three-hour difference in longitude is genuinely enough to move a tithi across midnight. If you want the wider year, our Nepal festival calendar for 2026 and 2027 carries every major festival; for the story behind the fifteen days rather than the diary, read what Dashain actually is and why it is celebrated.

Already looking further ahead? Dashain 2027 tika falls on Saturday 9 October — twelve days earlier than this year, which puts it right on the opening of the autumn trekking season.

Every day of Dashain 2026 and its date

Dashain is fifteen days long, but only six of them carry a name most households mark. Here they are with the Bikram Sambat date alongside, because that is how the dates are written on a Nepali calendar and it is the column people usually come here looking for.

You will notice 19 October has no name on it. That is not an omission. The Ashtami tithi runs out at 11:06am on 19 October and Navami takes over the same morning, and the Nepali patro fixes Maha Ashtami on the 18th and Maha Navami on the 20th, when Navami covers the hours the rituals actually need. Nineteen October falls in the gap. Several international calendars print Maha Navami on the 19th for exactly this reason, which is why two people with two phones can stand in the same room and disagree.

What time is Dashain tika in 2026

Tika on Vijaya Dashami is given while the Dashami tithi is running, and in 2026 that tithi closes at 2:26pm Nepal time on Wednesday 21 October. Sunrise in Kathmandu that morning is 6:07am. So the honest answer to the question people actually type is a window rather than a single minute: from first light until 2:26pm, with most families receiving tika from the eldest member of the household through the late morning and early afternoon.

There is usually also a single auspicious minute — the saita — fixed for the country by the Nepal Panchanga Nirnayak Samiti, the committee that settles the national calendar. As of 31 August 2026 we have not been able to verify a published saita for this year from the committee itself, and we are not going to print a time we cannot stand behind. It is normally announced in the weeks before Dashain; when it is, it will be added here. What will not change is the tithi deadline, because that is astronomy: after 2:26pm on 21 October the tenth day is over.

Tihar 2026 runs 7 to 11 November

Tihar is five days of oil lamps, marigold ropes and animals honoured one at a time — crow, dog, cow, ox — before it turns to people on the last day. In 2026 it opens on Saturday 7 November and ends with Bhai Tika on Wednesday 11 November, when sisters give their brothers a seven-coloured tika and a garland of makhamali, the globe amaranth that keeps its colour after it dries.

Bhai Tika has the same shape as Dashain tika: the Dwitiya tithi closes at 4:08pm on 11 November, so the tika is given before then, and again the exact saita is the committee’s to announce. If you are in Kathmandu on the 10th, that evening is also Newar new year — Nepal Sambat 1147 — and Mha Puja, when a Newar household worships each of its own members in turn. It is not a parade laid on for visitors; it is a family sitting on the floor of its own house. Watch from the street if you are invited to, and ask before you photograph anyone.

Why some calendars print Tihar a day earlier

This is the part worth knowing before you argue with a relative about it. In 2026 the Chaturdashi tithi ends at 11:42am on 8 November and Amavasya takes over the same afternoon, which compresses two of Tihar’s days into one. Nepali patros keep the five observances spread across 7 to 11 November and put Laxmi Puja on the evening of Sunday 8 November. Indian panchang engines, which compute Deepavali on the same new moon but order the days differently, print the sequence starting 6 November and land Bhai Dooj on the 10th.

For anything happening in Nepal — the public holiday, the closed bank, the flight your guide is trying to get on — the Nepali dates are the ones that bind. Bhai Tika in Nepal is 11 November 2026. Our longer piece on Tihar and how the five days are actually kept goes day by day through the rituals themselves.

What actually closes, and for how long

More than people expect, and for longer. Government offices, banks and the permit counters close for a multi-day national holiday clustered around Phulpati to Ekadashi — call it 17 to 22 October in 2026 — and neighbourhood shops, money changers and family-run restaurants shut for as long as their owners are away, which is often the better part of a week. We have run trips through every Dashain since 1998 and the pattern barely varies: Kathmandu empties, then refills all at once.

We have written the closures up in full in what closes in Nepal during Dashain 2026, and the transport crunch separately in what the festivals do to guides, flights and buses. Both are worth ten minutes if you are landing in October.

What it means if you are trekking

Very little on the trail itself, and quite a lot getting to it. Most Everest and Annapurna guides and porters are Sherpa, Gurung or Magar and already live in the valleys you are walking through, so they are not fighting for a seat on a plane to get home for tika. The pressure falls on the shared infrastructure — the same small domestic terminal that flies you to Lukla is carrying a nationwide holiday rush — and on the office and kitchen staff who travel furthest.

The compensation is real. Villages are strung with lights, jamara is yellow on every doorframe, and if you are walking through a settlement on tika day you will very likely be pulled in and given rice on your forehead by someone’s grandmother. It is not a performance arranged for trekkers; it is the busiest domestic week of the Nepali year happening to have you in it. October weather is also at its best — see when the monsoon actually clears if you are still choosing dates, or whether November is too late if you would rather walk after the crowds.

If you are outside Nepal

The tithi is calculated at a place, so the Nepali dates do not transfer cleanly. In the United States, Britain, Australia and Canada, Nepali associations almost always hold the community tika on the nearest weekend rather than on 21 October itself, and Bhai Tika likewise. If you are marking it at home and want the ritual on the correct tithi, work from the Kathmandu window — 21 October, ending 2:26pm Nepal time, which is 8:41am UTC — and convert. If you are going to a community event, ask the organisers, because they will have picked the Saturday.

When is Dashain 2026?

Dashain 2026 runs from Ghatasthapana on Sunday 11 October to Kojagrat Purnima on Sunday 25 October. The main day, Vijaya Dashami, is Wednesday 21 October 2026 — 4 Kartik 2083 in the Bikram Sambat calendar.

What time is tika on Dashain 2026?

Tika is given on 21 October while the Dashami tithi runs, from sunrise at 6:07am until the tithi closes at 2:26pm Kathmandu time. The single auspicious saita is announced separately by the Nepal Panchanga Nirnayak Samiti and had not been published when this page was last updated.

When is Tihar and Bhai Tika 2026?

Tihar 2026 runs Saturday 7 November to Wednesday 11 November. Bhai Tika is Wednesday 11 November, with the Dwitiya tithi closing at 4:08pm Kathmandu time.

Is everything closed in Nepal during Dashain?

Not everything, but more than you would expect. Government offices, banks and permit desks close for a multi-day holiday around 17–22 October 2026, and many family-run shops and restaurants shut for several days either side. Hotels, teahouses and the trekking trails themselves keep running.

Can I still trek during Dashain and Tihar?

Yes, and the trails are often quieter during the festivals than in the week that follows. Book domestic flights about a month ahead, have permits issued before the holiday, carry cash, and allow a spare day. Guides and porters in the Everest and Annapurna regions mostly live locally and keep working.

Why do calendars disagree about the 2026 dates?

Because the festivals follow lunar tithis that begin and end at a specific time at a specific place. A calendar computed for Kathmandu can differ by a day from one computed for London or Chicago, and in 2026 Tihar is affected: Nepali patros run it 7–11 November while Indian panchangs start it on 6 November.

Dates verified against the Kathmandu panchang (27°42′06″N, 85°19′14″E) and the Bikram Sambat 2083 Nepali patro on 31 August 2026. Public-holiday pattern and trekking logistics from Travel Himalaya Nepal field reporting, guiding autumn seasons since 1998.

Cover photo: Manish Ratna Buddhacharya via Pexels (Pexels License). Section photos: kabita Darlami via Pexels (Pexels licence); Sanket Mishra via Pexels (Pexels licence); Manish Ratna Buddhacharya via Pexels (Pexels licence); Dinesh lens via Pexels (Pexels licence).

More Nepal festivals

• Every Nepal festival date for 2026 and 2027
• Mani Rimdu at Tengboche, the October festival on the Everest trail
• Indra Jatra, the festival that opens Kathmandu’s season
• Chhath in the Terai, four days after Tihar ends