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Is 3 March a public holiday?

No Wednesday 3 March 2027 is not a public holiday anywhere in Australia. The nearest public holidays are King Island Show on Tue 2 Mar (parts of TAS), and Labour Day / Adelaide Cup Day / Eight Hours Day / Canberra Day on Mon 8 Mar (VIC, SA, TAS and ACT).

Public holidays are set state by state, so the same date can be a day off in one state and a normal Monday in the next. Here is what 3 March looks like in every published year.

  1. Monday 3 March 2025 Public holiday

    • Labour Day
      WA

    A Monday, so it makes a three-day weekend in WA. The long weekend planner shows what a few days of leave either side would add.

  2. Tuesday 3 March 2026 Regional only

    • King Island Show regional
      TAS
      King Island only

    A Tuesday, so one day of leave on Mon 2 Mar turns it into a four-day break in TAS (in the areas that observe it).

  3. Wednesday 3 March 2027 Working day

    No public holiday in any state or territory.

  4. Friday 3 March 2028 Working day

    No public holiday in any state or territory.

The holidays that fall on 3 March

  • Labour Day

    Labour Day commemorates the eight-hour working day, won by Melbourne stonemasons in April 1856 after a march from the University of Melbourne site to Parliament House. Sydney stonemasons had secured similar terms the year before. "Eight hours labour, eight hours recreation, eight hours rest" became the slogan of the trade union movement, and the anniversary was celebrated with processions long before it became a public holiday. Tasmania still calls its holiday Eight Hours Day. Because each colony marked its own anniversary, Labour Day never settled on a single national date, and the differences have only grown as states shuffled holidays to spread them through the year.

    More about Labour Day

  • King Island Show

    King Island's show holiday is the first Tuesday in March. It applies only in the King Island municipality, in Bass Strait off Tasmania's north-west tip, and is the earliest of the state's spring and autumn show days.

    More about King Island Show

March in the public holiday calendar

March is when the state calendars start to diverge. Western Australia takes Labour Day on the first Monday; Victoria and Tasmania take theirs on the second Monday, the same day as Canberra Day in the ACT and Adelaide Cup Day in South Australia. New South Wales, Queensland and the Northern Territory have nothing in March at all. When Easter falls early, Good Friday can land in the last week of the month. That mix is why a March date is often a holiday in four jurisdictions and a working day in the other four.

How public holidays are decided, and what you are owed

3 March FAQ

Is 3 March a public holiday in 2025?

Monday 3 March 2025 is Labour Day in WA. It is a normal working day everywhere else.

Is 3 March a public holiday in 2026?

Tuesday 3 March 2026 is King Island Show in parts of TAS (King Island only). It is a normal working day everywhere else.

Is 3 March a public holiday in 2027?

Wednesday 3 March 2027 is not a public holiday anywhere in Australia. The nearest public holidays are King Island Show on Tue 2 Mar (parts of TAS), and Labour Day / Adelaide Cup Day / Eight Hours Day / Canberra Day on Mon 8 Mar (VIC, SA, TAS and ACT).

Is 3 March a public holiday in 2028?

Friday 3 March 2028 is not a public holiday anywhere in Australia. The nearest public holidays are Launceston Cup on Wed 23 Feb (parts of TAS), and Labour Day on Mon 6 Mar (WA).

Looking for the whole year? Every 2027 public holiday by state