Out-of-focus angel lights against a deep blue evening sky at the Nuremberg Christkindlesmarkt.

Season 2026 / 27

Europe, by candlelight.

A guide to the Christmas markets worth crossing a border for. Dates are taken from the people who run them. Where they have not spoken, we do not invent a calendar.

The markets Plan a route

Angel lights at Nuremberg’s Christkindlesmarkt. The file description places them at the Laufer Tor. An earlier season, not 2026. Photograph: Marco Nürnberger, CC BY 2.0.

The edition

59 markets, across the cities people actually travel for and a handful of towns that are better than the cities. 44 of them have a 2026/27 season we could read on an official page. The rest are here because they matter, with the dates left open.

The stalls go up in November and, in most German cities, come down before Christmas Day. A few — Vienna, Salzburg, Prague, Brussels — have already published seasons that run past it. The difference is the whole point of planning.