Chuseok 2026 in Korea: Holiday Dates, Events and Deals

Chuseok 2026 falls on Friday, September 25. The public holiday runs from Thursday, September 24 to Saturday, September 26, 2026, and Sunday makes it a four-day break for most people in Korea. Korvia Consulting's Seoul office closes a day earlier, on Wednesday, September 23, and reopens on Monday, September 28 at 9 AM KST. From then, we will answer emails sent to support@korvia.com during the break in the order they arrived.

Chuseok 2026 at a glance:

• Wednesday, September 23: the last banking day before the break, so send money overseas before your bank's cut-off time. Korvia's office closes.
• Thursday, September 24: the holiday begins. Palaces, Jongmyo and the royal tombs are free, and expressway tolls are waived.
• Friday, September 25: Chuseok Day. The National Museum of Korea, its regional museums and the National Folk Museum of Korea are closed.
• Sunday, September 27: the last day of free palace entry and toll-free expressways.
• Monday, September 28: a regular working day. Korvia reopens at 9 AM KST.

What is Chuseok?

Chuseok, also called Hangawi, is Korea's autumn harvest holiday. It falls on the 15th day of the eighth lunar month, so its solar-calendar date changes every year.

For many Korean families it means a trip home. On Chuseok Day many hold charye, a memorial rite for their ancestors. Songpyeon, half-moon-shaped rice cakes filled with soybeans, sesame seeds or red beans and steamed over pine needles, are among the offerings on the table. Many also make seongmyo, a visit to the family graves to pay respects and tidy the site. At folk events you may see ganggangsullae, a circle dance where people join hands and sing under the full moon.

In Seoul the moon rises at 5:34 PM on Chuseok Day and is highest at 11:31 PM, according to the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute. It becomes exactly full only at 1:49 AM on September 27, so on Chuseok night it looks slightly thin on its left side.

The government expects about 30.93 million people to travel during its special transport period, September 23 to 27, most of them by car. Seoul gets quieter, and the events below are good options for anyone who stays.

To wish your co-teachers or neighbors a good holiday this week, say Chuseok jal bonaeseyo (추석 잘 보내세요), "Have a good Chuseok."

Is Monday, September 28, 2026 a holiday in Korea?

No, Monday, September 28 is an ordinary working day. Under Korea's public holiday regulation, Chuseok earns a substitute holiday only when one of its days falls on a Sunday, or on a weekday that is also another public holiday. This year the last day is a Saturday, which does not count. As of September 22, 2026 the government had not announced a temporary holiday for that Monday either. We will update this page if that changes.

If you teach, plan the trip back for Sunday unless your school has told you otherwise. Hagwon schedules vary more, so check your contract and your academy's calendar.

October brings two more long weekends. National Foundation Day is Saturday, October 3, so Monday, October 5 is a substitute holiday, and Hangeul Day on Friday, October 9 gives a three-day weekend.

Are palaces free during Chuseok 2026?

Yes. The Korea Heritage Service announced free admission from Thursday, September 24 to Sunday, September 27, 2026 at Gyeongbokgung, Changdeokgung, Deoksugung and Changgyeonggung palaces, Jongmyo Shrine and the Joseon royal tombs. Free admission does not cover the Secret Garden (Huwon) tour at Changdeokgung or the palaces' separately booked paid programs, such as night tours.

Gyeongbokgung is open from 9 AM to 6 PM (last entry 5 PM), with its regular guided tours suspended for these days. The royal guard ceremonies still run with no booking: the changing of the guard at Heungnyemun Gate at 10 AM and 2 PM, the gate-watch ceremony at Gwanghwamun at 11 AM and 1 PM, and a patrol procession at 3 PM, whose route can change on the day.

Jongmyo usually runs on timed tours, but for these four days you can walk in from 9 AM to 6 PM (last entry 5 PM). Its guided tours on September 24 to 26 are in Korean only.

If crowds put you off, the same sites are free again from October 29 to November 15 during the Korea Grand Festival, regular closing days excepted. All of them open on the substitute holiday, Monday, October 5, and close on Tuesday, October 6.

What is open on Chuseok Day, Friday, September 25?

The National Museum of Korea and its regional national museums, as well as the National Folk Museum of Korea, close on Chuseok Day, Friday, September 25, 2026, and reopen on Saturday, September 26. Try one of these instead:

• Namsangol Hanok Village (Chungmuro Station, exit 4). The Chuseok festival opens on the 25th with a talk on laying out a charye table at 12 PM (the listing does not mention English) and a lantern performance at 7:30 PM. The first 100 people in the audience get an LED lantern. Entry is free.
• National Gugak Center, Seocho. An outdoor Chuseok-night performance, 휘영청 둥근 달 ("the bright round moon"), runs from 7:30 to 9 PM. Seats cost ₩10,000 through NOL Ticket, and booking closes at 6 PM the day before.
• Unhyeongung, near Anguk Station. Folk games, crafts and gugak from 11 AM to 5 PM (more below).
• Korean Folk Village, Yongin. A farmers' band ritual performance at 11:30 AM, plus the daily Chuseok program described below.
• The palaces and Jongmyo, free all day.
• Busan Museum, if you are in Busan (see below).

Chuseok 2026 events in Seoul, day by day

Thursday, September 24

The National Museum of Korea (Ichon Station, exit 2) has free traditional music on its open plaza at 1 PM and 3 PM, with no reservation needed, and repeats the schedule on the 26th and 27th.

Unhyeongung has folk games, crafts and gugak performances from 11 AM to 5 PM every day from the 24th to the 27th, Chuseok Day included, according to the Seoul city listing. Try jegichagi, yutnori, tuho and archery. Some crafts cost extra.

Saturday, September 26

The National Folk Museum of Korea, inside the Gyeongbokgung grounds, holds Everyone Together for Hangawi (모두 함께 한가위) on Saturday and Sunday. If you only go to one event, make it this one. Of everything we found, it gives the most complete hands-on lesson in what Chuseok is about:

• a ssireum wrestling class from 1 to 2 PM, then a walk-in ssireum competition for adults and children from 3 to 5 PM;
• ganggangsullae that anyone can join, at 11:30 AM, 2 PM and 4:30 PM;
• threshing rice with a traditional thresher and winnower, and straw crafts.

Everything is free and first come, first served, with daily caps on most activities. Program information is in Korean only, and activities fill up, so arrive early.

The Seoul Museum of History (Gwanghwamun Station, exit 7) runs a free Chuseok day from 12 to 4 PM on Saturday only, with folk games, crafts, fusion gugak busking, a souvenir for visitors wearing hanbok and an event corner the city says foreign visitors can join. The National Museum of Korea stays open until 9 PM on Saturdays.

Sunday, September 27

Namsangol offers free hanbok dressing, traditional makeup and hair styling from 1 to 8 PM. Sign up on site; no reservation is needed. A traditional tightrope-walking (julttagi) show starts at 1 PM.

At Banpo Hangang Park, the car-free Jamsu Bridge festival holds a moonlight Chuseok gathering from 3 to 6 PM, with traditional music and dance from Korea, Argentina, Bulgaria, Russia, Panama and Kazakhstan, plus folk games such as yutnori. Just turn up.

Chuseok 2026 events outside Seoul

Korean Folk Village, Yongin. From September 24 to 27, houses across the village run a Chuseok program from 1 to 5 PM: set a charye table, make songpyeon and see olbyeosimni, the offering of the year's first rice to the ancestors. Online weekend and holiday tickets cost ₩23,900. At the ticket booth, an adult or youth in full hanbok (a jeogori with goreum ties, plus a hanbok skirt or hanbok trousers) pays ₩19,000 instead of ₩39,000 until September 30, an offer that cannot be combined with other discounts. We could not confirm the village's holiday opening hours, so check the official site before you set out.

Suwon. Hwaseong Haenggung Palace opens at night, 6 to 9:30 PM, on Fridays to Sundays and public holidays, which covers every night from the 24th to the 27th. Adult admission is ₩2,000, and anyone in hanbok, modern hanbok included, gets in free. The Suwon Hwaseong media art show runs on the fortress until October 6, from 6 to 10 PM.

Busan. Busan Museum (Daeyeon Station, exit 3) is open on Chuseok Day. From September 25 to 27, 10 AM to 5 PM with a break from 12 to 1, you can wear a dopo robe and gat hat and ride around in a horse costume. Sign up on site 20 minutes before each session. The outdoor folk games need no registration, and everything is free.

Jeonju. The National Jeonju Museum holds folk games on September 24, 26 and 27 (it closes on the 25th). The songpyeon-making session on the 24th is free but needs a booking on the museum's website.

Andong. The Andong Maskdance Festival runs from September 24 to October 4, with the opening ceremony on Friday, September 25 at 6 PM.

Gyeongju. An announcement from the Gyeongbuk Culture and Tourism Organization, carried by the Korean outlet fnnews on September 22, offers free entry to Gyeongju Expo Park from September 24 to 27 for anyone wearing hanbok or their own country's traditional dress. We could not find it on the park's own site, so check before you pack your kilt.

Chuseok 2026 deals and discounts

Expressway tolls. Tolls are waived nationwide for all vehicles from 00:00 on Thursday, September 24 to 24:00 on Sunday, September 27, 2026, private expressways included. Any trip that touches that window is free: entering on the 23rd and leaving on the 24th counts, as does entering on the 27th and leaving on the 28th. Keep your Hi-pass unit switched on; in cash lanes you still take a ticket at the entrance and hand it in at the exit. Korea Expressway Corporation service stations also cut fuel by ₩100 per liter over the same four days.

Trains. Korail's special fares take 30 to 50% off remaining seats on 793 trains running from September 23 to 27, except Chuseok Day. A KTX set for four people costs ₩99,000 one way, whatever the distance. The fares are first come, first served on korail.com and the Korail+ (코레일+) app. We did not check how many seats were left, or whether the fares appear on Korail's English booking pages.

Hanbok. Wearing full hanbok cuts ticket-booth entry at Korean Folk Village to ₩19,000 and gets you into Hwaseong Haenggung free. Namsangol will dress you in one for free on Sunday.

Movies. CGV's holiday coupons take ₩3,000 off a 2D ticket and ₩3,000 off a snack combo through the CGV app, until October 11. We have not tested them with a phone number registered to a foreign resident.

Everland. From September 24 to 27, staff in hanbok greet guests at the gate, and Carnival Plaza has yutnori and ddakji for any park guest to try. Everland's announcement also mentions a special promotion for foreign residents over the holiday, but we could not find its terms when we checked, so look in the Everland app before you buy.

Are banks, hospitals and transport open during Chuseok 2026?

Send money home by Wednesday

The Financial Services Commission says overseas remittances and cross-border payments are difficult to process normally from September 24 to 27 and advises arranging them in advance, so if you send part of your salary home, do it by Wednesday, September 23 and check your bank's cut-off time for that day. Card bills and automatic payments due during the break are taken on Monday, September 28 with no late fee, unless you have a separate arrangement with the company that bills you. Loans that mature during the holiday roll over to the 28th with no late interest. Bank booths at Incheon and Gimpo airports stay open for currency exchange.

If you get sick

Nationwide, 416 emergency medical centers stay open around the clock. Chuseok Day is the thin day: the Ministry of Health and Welfare planned 5,231 open hospitals, clinics and pharmacies on September 25, against 11,781 on the 24th, and advises calling before you go. In Seoul, 74 emergency rooms stay open 24 hours, and 6,189 clinics and pharmacies open over the four days, about 1,547 a day on average.

In an emergency, call 119, which offers interpretation for foreign callers. To find an open hospital, clinic or pharmacy, use the E-Gen site (e-gen.or.kr), the 응급똑똑 app or the 129 call center. None is confirmed to offer English, so ask a Korean friend or co-teacher to help. 1339 is no longer the emergency medical line; it is now the disease-control agency's call center. Seoul's 120 Dasan Call Center runs its English line only on weekdays from 9 AM to 6 PM, so English help is unavailable from September 24 to 27; the Korean line runs 24 hours.

Getting around

Expect the worst traffic leaving Seoul on Thursday morning and coming back on Friday afternoon. In Seoul, the subway and buses run late only on Saturday and Sunday, September 26 and 27, with last trains on Seoul Metro lines 1 to 8, Line 9 and the Ui-Sinseol and Sillim lines reaching their final stations at about 1 AM; Korail-run sections follow Korail's own schedule. Korail sold 84% of its Chuseok seats in the pre-sale; whatever is left is on korail.com and the Korail+ app. Our public transportation guide covers the basics.

Who to call, and what is closed

The 1330 Korea Travel Hotline offers English help around the clock, according to the Korea Tourism Organization. The 1345 immigration contact center lists weekday hours only, and immigration offices close from September 24 to 26, so sort out any ARC or visa questions by Wednesday.

EBN and Yonhap reported on September 21 that Lotte, Shinsegae and Hyundai department stores close for two days around Chuseok Day, store by store, and that many large supermarkets close or shorten their hours on the 25th, so check your branch's app before you go.

After the break: Korvia Party on October 3

The next long weekend starts on Saturday, October 3, and we are spending it at the Gangnam Festival. The Korvia Party Fall 2026 is free, with check-in from 1 PM at the KORVIA and KFTRA booths on Dosan-daero, a quiz show and a MacBook raffle drawn at 5:30 PM. RSVP on the party page for an extra raffle ticket. Our 30 free passes for native English speakers to the October 4 K-POP concert are all claimed, but the waitlist is open.

Also coming up:

• Busan International Film Festival, October 6 to 15
• Jinju Namgang Yudeung (Lantern) Festival, October 3 to 18
• The Seoul Culture Lounge, a paid program for foreign nationals living in or visiting Korea, runs Chuseok-themed classes after the holiday, including Chuseok food cooking on September 30 and pansori on October 1. Booking opens seven days before each session.

How we checked this guide

On September 22, 2026 we checked dates, times and prices against the organizer's own page, a government announcement or the law itself, and linked the source wherever we could. Two items rest on Korean news reports, as the text says: the Gyeongju Expo Park offer and the store hours. The party details come from our own event page. Programs can change with the weather, so confirm on the day. Background on the holiday comes from the Korea Astronomy and Space Science Institute's 2026 almanac, the National Folk Museum of Korea and VisitKorea's Chuseok 2026 guide.

Photos from Unsplash: Moon over Namsan by Riza Gabriela · Oeam Folk Village by insung yoon · Gyeongbokgung guard ceremony by Keisha Østergaard · Hanok at night by zero take · Farmers' band by zero take · Hanbok at Gyeongbokgung by Winged Jedi.