According to GOV.UK, Good Friday is Friday 26 March 2027 and Easter Monday is Monday 29 March 2027 in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, Good Friday is a bank holiday but Easter Monday is not.

A few other dates sit close by and are worth putting in the same calendar:

• Mothering Sunday Sunday 7 March 2027, three weeks before Easter Sunday, so any gifting content has an even earlier deadline

• Clocks go forward British Summer Time starts at 1am on Sunday 28 March 2027, which is Easter Sunday itself

• The next bank holidays The early May bank holiday is Monday 3 May 2027 and the spring bank holiday is Monday 31 May 2027, across the UK

The point for planning is simple: the long weekend lands in the last week of March, and the lighter evenings only arrive with it.

Easter is a shopping moment, and much of the deciding happens on screens before the weekend. Ahead of Easter 2026, a survey of 1,000 UK consumers by the retail marketing agency Savvy, reported by Grocery Gazette, forecast Easter retail sales of £1.6bn, up 14% on the year. In the same survey:

• Social media A third said social media shapes their Easter choices, rising to 35% for short-form video

• Newness 58% wanted to try new seasonal products and 49% were looking for limited-edition lines

• Going out 45% of those celebrating planned to eat out at a pub or restaurant over the long weekend

Those are 2026 figures, and 2027 will have its own. But they show why the content needs to be in feeds and on product pages in the days before Good Friday, not finished on the Thursday.

There is no official cut-off. What follows is how we would plan backwards from a live date for Easter 2027, assuming one round of changes and content that runs through the fortnight before the weekend.

• Early January Write the brief: the product, the offer, the platforms, the number of shots or posts, and the date everything must go live

• Mid to late January Shortlist models or creators, check availability and hold castings if you need them. If you are new to this, see how castings work

• February Shoot. Before the clocks change, daylight is short, so plan outdoor spring looks around the middle of the day or use a daylight studio

• By early March Edit, approve and schedule. Agree usage and paid spend now rather than after the content is live

• From Monday 15 March Content goes live and builds through the week before Easter

• Thursday 25 March The last full working day before the long weekend across the UK, and the latest sensible point for any final approval

If part of the campaign is for Mothering Sunday on 7 March, bring every step forward by about three weeks. For creators, our Black Friday post covers how much notice creators say they want, and the same thinking applies here. Our pages on model campaigns and creator and talent campaigns explain how we run each.

Some campaigns want something to happen over the weekend itself: a live post, a store launch, an in-person activation. A few rules and dates change what is possible.

• Scotland works on Monday Easter Monday is not a bank holiday in Scotland, so a Scottish team, venue or retailer may be open as usual on 29 March

• Large shops close on Easter Sunday GOV.UK says shops over 280 square metres in England and Wales must close on Easter Sunday. Scotland has no trading hours restrictions

• Bank holidays are not automatic days off GOV.UK notes there is no automatic right to public holidays off unless a contract says so, so agree any weekend shoot or posting dates in the booking itself

For brands planning an in-store moment, our event production team can help work around the closures. With so many people eating out over the weekend, restaurants and bars may want to look at hospitality PR as part of the same plan.

Easter usually means chocolate, and the advertising rules for it changed in 2026. According to GOV.UK, restrictions on less healthy food and drink took effect UK-wide on 5 January 2026: a 9pm watershed for TV advertising and a total restriction on paid-for advertising online.

The Advertising Association says the online restriction covers all types of paid-for advertising, including search, banner ads and influencer marketing. The rules include a separate exemption for brand advertising, set out in its own regulations.

If your Easter campaign features chocolate, sweets or other treats, check whether the product is in scope before you brief creators. A paid creator post for a product that falls inside the rules may not be allowed to run at all. Paid creator posts for any product still need a clear "ad" label. If the food side rules out paid posts, organic content or user-generated content for your own channels may still fit.