Shopping Sundays in Germany: where shops open today and this weekend

Since 2006 the states have been responsible for shop hours. All have passed their own acts, Bavaria last, with effect from 1 August 2025. They resemble each other in substance but differ a great deal in detail.

Maximum. Three days in Baden-Württemberg, four in eleven states, five in Brandenburg, six per town in Lower Saxony, eight in Berlin and North Rhine-Westphalia. In Lower Saxony a single district may use no more than four of them; in North Rhine-Westphalia a town can reach up to sixteen days through district releases. Berlin also lets each shop add two days for its own occasion, such as an anniversary.

Who decides. In most states the town, by ordinance. Berlin sets the days for the whole city by a general order of the Senate administration, Hesse requires a general order published three months ahead, and in Thuringia districts and independent towns decide. In Saarland the shops choose themselves and notify the local police authority.

Occasion. Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg, Bremen, Hesse and others require a festival, market or fair. North Rhine-Westphalia also lists reviving town centres and supporting retail; Lower Saxony and Saxony-Anhalt a public interest in revival. Saarland and Rhineland-Palatinate name no specific occasion in the act. In full: the shop opening acts compared.

Article 140 of the Basic Law incorporates Article 139 of the Weimar Constitution: Sunday and state-recognised holidays remain protected by law as days of rest from work and of spiritual elevation. That does not ban all work, but it sets a rule: rest is the norm, opening the justified exception.

The Federal Constitutional Court spelled this out for shop opening on 1 December 2009. Berlin had released all four Advent Sundays; the court found a breach because the exception had become the rule. A mere interest in turnover on the shops’ side and in shopping on the customers’ side is not enough. Since then administrative courts have examined every release for a sound reason and for whether the festival, not shopping, defines the day.

For shoppers this has a practical consequence: an announced Sunday is only certain once it has happened. Trade unions regularly challenge ordinances, and courts stop individual dates in urgent proceedings. That is why the finder shows the source for every date, so you can check the position yourself.

For 2026 the list holds 390 entries, 232 of them from September onwards. An entry is one Sunday in one area: a town releasing the same day for three districts has three entries. The yearly overview is under shopping Sundays 2026.

For 2027, 19 towns have adopted dates so far, 79 in total. Most towns decide between November and February. Easter Sunday 2027 is 28 March 2027; since it is barred everywhere, spring festivals with a shopping Sunday often move a week earlier or later. What is already fixed: shopping Sundays 2027.

For 22 towns we found no official notice for 2026. Partly there were no releases, partly towns announce their dates only briefly in press releases. The list of every town with its status is under shopping Sundays by town.

Even without a shopping Sunday not everything is shut. Every state lets bakeries, pastry shops and florists open for a few hours, often with limits on holidays. Petrol stations may sell travel needs and pharmacies run emergency rotas. Shops in railway stations and airports may sell travel goods, in many states a wider range too.

Then there are spa, recreation and excursion resorts. Shops with tourist goods there may often open on many Sundays a year, on the coast during the season, for example. These rules have nothing to do with the towns’ shopping Sundays and are not on our list; they follow separate provisions and usually cover selected goods. Where a town announces such a special rule as a date, as Bremerhaven does for the Havenwelten, the entry is marked accordingly.

For each town we first look for the ordinance or general order in the official gazette, then the town’s own page and that of its marketing company. We take the date, area, occasion and hours as they stand there and note the reading date. Where an ordinance gives a rule rather than a date, such as “the second Sunday in October”, we compute the date and say so.

We do not use aggregator sites, shopping-centre advertising or newspaper articles. They are often right but not always current, and they cannot be traced back to a decision of the town. Where there is no official source we write “not yet published” or “no source” rather than guess. We read the acts in the states’ law portals. Details of the method are under method.

No shop, chain or shopping centre is promoted here. Where an ordinance names individual stores, we describe the area neutrally.

Until the end of July 2025 Bavaria still applied the federal Shop Closing Act, with four Sundays and holidays. The Bavarian Shop Closing Act keeps the four days but sets them out anew: no more than five consecutive hours between 10 am and 6 pm, an occasion drawing a substantial number of visitors, and a fixed list of barred days, including the Advent Sundays in December. New are up to eight late shopping nights on weekdays until midnight that the town may release, and four more that each shop may notify itself.

The first Advent Sunday stays possible in Bavaria when it falls in November, as on 29 November 2026. More on Bavarian towns under shopping Sundays in Bavaria, such as Munich or Landshut.