Orthodox Easter Date Calculator (Pascha) for Any Year
The Gregorian date of Orthodox Easter in a given year, how many days after Western Easter it falls, and the same day in the Julian calendar the Church uses to compute it.
Results
What this tool does
Eastern Orthodox churches that keep the traditional calendar still compute Easter by the Julian calendar: the first Sunday after the Julian full moon that falls on or after 21 March (Julian). Because the Julian calendar runs 13 days behind the Gregorian one in the 20th and 21st centuries, that date is shifted forward before we see it, and the full moon is also computed by the older rule. The result is that Orthodox Easter falls on the same Sunday as Western Easter in some years (such as 2025) and up to five weeks later in others. Easter itself is celebrated on the Julian-computed date in all of these churches, even those that use the revised Julian calendar for fixed feasts.
Formula
Julian computus (Meeus): d = (19 × (y mod 19) + 15) mod 30, e = (2 × (y mod 4) + 4 × (y mod 7) − d + 34) mod 7 → Julian date, then + (⌊y/100⌋ − ⌊y/400⌋ − 2) days
Variables
| Symbol | Meaning | Unit |
|---|---|---|
yr | Year | — |
OD | Orthodox Easter — day of the month | — |
OM | Orthodox Easter — month (3 = March, 4 = April, 5 = May) | — |
OA | Days after Western Easter | d |
JM | The same day in the Julian calendar — month | — |
JD | The same day in the Julian calendar — day of the month | — |
Worked example
- Year2026
- Orthodox Easter — day of the month12
- Orthodox Easter — month (3 = March, 4 = April, 5 = May)4
- Days after Western Easter7 d
- The same day in the Julian calendar — month3
- The same day in the Julian calendar — day of the month30
Limitations
- Dates are handled in the proleptic Gregorian calendar, which is the one computers use. For dates before the Gregorian reform of 1582 this differs from what was written at the time.
- Only Saturdays and Sundays are excluded. Public holidays differ by country and are not deducted.