The liturgical year
The Year in Colour
One holy year across the two Orthodox calendars — the fasting seasons, the great feasts, and the colour each day carries.
Drawn for 2026 on the New Calendar. Sign in to follow the Old Calendar.
Dates marked * are movable — they hang off Pascha, which is reckoned the same way for all of Orthodoxy, so they fall on the same day whichever calendar you keep. Everything else moves thirteen days between the two. Colours follow common Slavic practice.
The seasons of 2026
- Meatfare Week · February 9 – February 15 · 7 days
No fast today. Everything is permitted. - Cheesefare Week · February 16 – February 22 · 7 days
No meat. Dairy, eggs and fish are permitted. - Great Lent · February 23 – April 4 · 41 days
No meat, dairy, eggs or fish. Oil and wine are permitted. - Holy Week · April 5 – April 11 · 7 days
No meat, dairy, eggs, fish, oil or wine. - Bright Week · April 12 – April 18 · 7 days
No fast today. Everything is permitted. - Pentecost Week · May 31 – June 6 · 7 days
No fast today. Everything is permitted. - Apostles' Fast · June 8 – June 28 · 21 days
No meat, dairy, eggs, fish, oil or wine. - Dormition Fast · August 1 – August 14 · 14 days
No meat, dairy, eggs or fish. Oil and wine are permitted. - Nativity Fast · November 15 – December 24 · 40 days
No meat, dairy or eggs. Fish, oil and wine are permitted.
Today · September 28, 2026
No fast today
Shown on the New Calendar. Sign in to follow the Old Calendar.
The colours
- Gold · default
- Theotokos blue
- Lenten purple
- Fast wine
- Pentecost green
- Martyric red
- Paschal white
- Holy Week ink
The cross across the site takes the colour of the day you are reading on, drawn from the same palette. Paschal white is the one exception: it is nearly invisible against this page, so Pascha and Bright Week invert the whole site to gold on ink instead.