What Australia Day is

Kept on 26 January, marking the raising of the British flag at Sydney Cove in 1788. It became a nationally consistent public holiday on that fixed date only in 1994.

The date is actively contested. Many Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people mark it as Invasion Day or Survival Day, and several local councils have moved or renamed their events. Any page counting down to it should note that the occasion is not uniformly celebrated.

Why this date does not move

The countdown at the top of this page is live, and the date beneath it is the next occurrence. This is a fixed date: it falls on the same day of the month every year, so only the weekday changes.

The date follows a fixed calendar rule, so it can be computed years ahead. Where a country observes this as a public holiday, the official government calendar remains the authority for whether the day off is moved when it falls on a weekend.

What is coming up next

Once this date passes, the countdown moves on according to the recurrence rule described above. Calculated lunar dates remain estimates until the relevant calendar or local authority confirms them. See the full list of upcoming events, or use the countdown timer for a duration of your own.