Diwali 2027 in USA, UK and Canada Is Thursday 28 October

Diwali 2027 in USA, UK and Canada Is Thursday 28 October

Diwali 2027 in USA, UK and Canadian time zones falls on Thursday 28 October, one evening before India's Friday 29 October. Lakshmi Puja follows Amavasya at local sunset, and the new moon that ends Amavasya arrives at 9:36 AM in New York and 2:36 PM in London on the 29th, before sunset in either city. Australia and New Zealand keep Friday, like India. Singapore's puja evening is Friday too, but its Ministry of Manpower lists the Deepavali public holiday on Thursday 28 October 2027.

Two SubhSandesh numbers shape how to send the greeting: 48.3% of shared pages are opened on a phone, and a page is viewed 11.1 times on average, so one link can carry both evenings. Below: city-by-city sunset and Amavasya times, what the California and Pennsylvania Diwali laws actually say about dates, the British clock-change catch, and a sending plan across time zones.

What decides the Diwali 2027 date outside India

A tithi is a lunar day defined by the angle between the Moon and the Sun, so it starts and ends at one instant for the whole planet. Lakshmi Puja is done on the evening when the Amavasya tithi is running at local sunset, which means the same instant can land on different calendar evenings in different countries.

For 2027 the instants are fixed. The US Naval Observatory's moon-phase table for October 2027 puts the new moon, the moment Amavasya ends, at 13:36 UT on 29 October. Our own calculation with the open-source Astronomy Engine library puts the start of Amavasya at 15:19 UT on 28 October, which is 8:49 PM IST, within two minutes of the times Indian panchangs print.

If Amavasya is still running at a city's sunset on Friday 29 October, it keeps India's date. If it has already ended, the puja moves back to Thursday 28 October, provided Amavasya had begun by Thursday's sunset.

Diwali 2027 city by city: the five places most families ask about

The table compares each city's puja evening. Sunset is the observatory's one-day data (retrieved 22 October 2026); Amavasya is in local time.

The split runs along longitude, not along how Indian a city's community is. Everything west of the Gulf moves to Thursday; everything east of India stays on Friday.

London is the tightest of the western cities. Amavasya begins there at 4:19 PM BST on Thursday, only 82 minutes before the 5:41 PM sunset, so a British family that checks the date on an Indian calendar alone could easily miss that the tithi is already running.

For other diaspora centres we ran the same Astronomy Engine calculation, which matches the observatory's sunsets above to within a minute. The results:

• United States: Chicago and Houston, sunset 5:50 PM and 6:38 PM CDT on Thursday 28 October; San Jose, 6:14 PM PDT; Honolulu, 5:57 PM HST. All Thursday.
• Canada: Vancouver, sunset 5:57 PM PDT on Thursday 28 October, with Amavasya running until 6:36 AM Friday. Thursday, like Toronto.
• United Kingdom: Leicester 5:42 PM and Glasgow 5:46 PM BST on Thursday 28 October. Thursday.
• Australia and New Zealand: Melbourne 7:50 PM AEDT and Perth 6:38 PM AWST on Friday 29 October; Auckland 7:50 PM NZDT the same Friday. All Friday.

Why New York gets a whole night and Singapore under three hours

In India the 2027 evening is short. Delhi's sun sets at 5:38 PM on 29 October and Amavasya ends at 7:06 PM IST, so families there have about 88 minutes of the tithi after sunset, which is why Indian panchangs print such a narrow Lakshmi Puja window this year.

West of India the pressure disappears. In New York, Toronto and London the tithi runs from Thursday's sunset until the next morning or afternoon, so a puja delayed until 9 PM because someone is stuck on a train is still inside Amavasya.

East of India the window sits in between. Singapore has 2 hours 45 minutes between its 6:51 PM sunset and the 9:36 PM end of Amavasya, and Perth about 2 hours 58 minutes, so a late dinner first and puja afterwards does not work there. Sydney is easier, with 5 hours 16 minutes before Amavasya ends at 12:36 AM on Saturday.

Is Diwali 2027 a holiday? School and work notes for each country

Diwali is not a federal holiday in the United States. The Office of Personnel Management's list of federal holidays for 2027 carries 11 days and none of them is Diwali, though a Diwali Day Act was introduced in Congress in May 2023.

Two states have gone further. California's AB 268, Chapter 358 of the Statutes of 2025, adds Diwali to the state's holidays, lets public schools and community colleges close if the governing board agrees, and lets state employees take 8 hours of holiday credit for it in place of a personal holiday. Pennsylvania's Act 112 of 2024, signed on 22 October 2024, names "Diwali Day" but states that schools, government offices and businesses are not required to close.

Neither law names a calendar date. Both define Diwali as the 15th day of the month of Kartik in the Hindu lunar calendar, which in 2027 an American panchang reads as Thursday 28 October and an Indian one as Friday 29 October. If your district or employer is choosing a day off, ask which date it means before the school calendar is printed.

Britain and Canada have no Diwali holiday. GOV.UK's 2027 list has 8 bank holidays for England and Wales, none of them Diwali, and the Canada Revenue Agency's 2026 public-holiday list has none either. Book leave for the Thursday evening and, if family in India matters, the Friday morning too.

The clock-change catch: how far behind India you are that week

British clocks go back at 2 AM on Sunday 31 October 2027, according to GOV.UK's clock-change table. That is three days after Diwali, so during Diwali week London is 4 hours 30 minutes behind IST, not the 5 hours 30 minutes most people remember from winter calls.

North America changes later, on Sunday 7 November 2027, so New York and Toronto stay 9 hours 30 minutes behind India and Vancouver and California 12 hours 30 minutes behind. Sydney is on daylight time from early October and sits 5 hours 30 minutes ahead of IST, while Singapore is 2 hours 30 minutes ahead all year.

Indian families usually light the first diyas soon after sunset, at about 6:00 PM IST on Friday 29 October. At that moment the clocks abroad read:

• London: 1:30 PM Friday
• New York and Toronto: 8:30 AM Friday
• Vancouver and San Jose: 5:30 AM Friday
• Singapore: 8:30 PM Friday
• Sydney: 11:30 PM Friday

Sending a Diwali greeting across time zones in 2027

Families already plan calls around this gap. A 2025 qualitative study of 20 left-behind older adults in Kerala quotes a parent whose daughter, living five and a half hours behind, calls in the evening and makes sure to do it before her mother goes to bed. The time difference, not the will, decides when the call happens.

Diwali 2027 makes that harder, because the diaspora celebrates on Thursday and India on Friday. A practical order: call India on Thursday morning your time, which is their Thursday evening; light your own diyas on Thursday night; then call again on Friday at the moment India's puja begins, using the list above.

The link travels better than the call. In the only festival lead-time data we have, which is Raksha Bandhan 2026 rather than Diwali and covers a small sample of n = 89 pages, 49.4% of pages were built on the festival day itself. Abroad in 2027 that habit backfires, because building on Friday means sending after India's evening has started; build it by Thursday.

SubhSandesh's interactive Diwali card with photos and music is a page you send as a private link: they light a diya at their door with your tag on it, light a row of wish diyas, release sky lanterns carrying up to six of your photos, and open a letter from a red-and-gold shagun liffafa. It takes about five minutes, opens in any phone or laptop browser with no app or account, and has modes for your love, family or a friend.

If the person you are wishing is a partner on the other side of an ocean, the miss-you page with countdown and open-when letters fits the distance better than a festival card. Its senders have already named 47 distinct city pairs, including Mumbai-London.

When a Diwali link is the wrong thing to send

A link only works for someone who opens links. Since 48.3% of shared pages are opened on a phone, the other 51.7% are seen on laptops, desktops and tablets, but a grandparent who uses neither will get nothing from it, and a phone call at 6:00 PM IST on Friday beats any page.

It is also the wrong choice if you will be in the same room. Families flying home for Diwali 2027 should carry the mithai box and skip the digital version, and anyone whose temple prints a local panchang should follow the temple's date over this page or any website, including ours.

Sources

• US Naval Observatory, Astronomical Applications: moon phases for October 2027 and one-day sun data for London, Toronto, Sydney and Singapore (computed ephemeris, retrieved 22 October 2026).
• California Legislative Information: AB 268, State holidays: Diwali, Chapter 358, Statutes of 2025.
• Office of the Governor of Pennsylvania: Act 112 of 2024 press release, 22 October 2024.
• GOV.UK: When do the clocks change? (updated 24 November 2025).
• Mohan A. et al., "Care Beyond Co-Residence", International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 18 November 2025 (Europe PMC).
• Astronomy Engine (Don Cross, open-source library, version 2.1.19) for Amavasya start and the other cities' sunsets.