School Holidays NSW 2027: Every Term Date and What To Do During the Break

NSW students finish school on 18 December 2026 and return on 3 February 2027. Here’s a guide to every 2027 term date, staff development day, and holidays.

When are the NSW school holidays in 2027?

There are four holiday periods across the NSW government school year, and the summer break is by far the longest at about six weeks. The table below is the full Eastern Division year, taken from the NSW Department of Education 2027 calendar.

When does each term start and finish in 2027?

What are staff development days, and do students attend school?

Students do not attend staff development days. They are staff days for planning and professional learning, and they tend to take place at the start of most terms. Confusion often arises because staff development days they fall between the published holiday end date and the first day back, so parents mistakenly believe school resumes earlier.

So the summer holidays officially end on 27 January, but students do not go back until 3 February. That gap is six days of development days, and it is the single most misread part of the NSW calendar.

Why do Western Division schools start later?

Schools in the far west of NSW run on a different calendar with extra vacation days at the start of each year, so their students begin Term 1 a week after the rest of the state. Only Term 1 differs. From Term 2 onward the dates are identical.

A small number of schools near the Victorian and Queensland borders also run dates that differ from the standard calendar. If your school is near a border, check its own website rather than the state calendar.

Related course: January 2027 holiday courses

Matrix holiday courses run inside the summer break, beginning Monday 11 January 2027, which is far enough past Christmas that children are rested and far enough before 3 February that what they do is still fresh when school starts.

Years 3 to 10 courses are four days at two hours a day and consolidate the year just finished. Years 11 and 12 holiday accelerated courses are five or nine days at three hours and cover a full term of senior content. Timetables, campuses and current fees are on the holiday courses page.

View holiday courses

What should your child do over the summer holidays?

Less than the internet suggests. Six weeks is the only genuinely unstructured stretch in a NSW school year, and a child who returns in February rested does better than one who has been quietly schooled through January.

Three things are worth the small investment in time and effort and none of them takes long.

Reading materials of your child’s choice. Anything they will actually finish. A child who reads three books they liked has done more for their English than a term of comprehension worksheets, and the habit matters more than the titles.

Maths fluency in small doses. Five or ten minutes, a few times a week. Number facts decay faster than anything else over a long break because they depend most on recent practice, and a short regular habit protects them better than one long session.

A deliberate fortnight of nothing. Children who go straight from Term 4 into holiday programs and then into Term 1 arrive in February already tired. Protect the end of December and the week before school goes back.

Where a holiday course earns its place, it is usually because a specific topic never landed, because the year ended badly and confidence needs rebuilding, or because a transition year is coming. If none of those describes your child, the honest advice is to let them have the summer. Our Year 3 to Year 10 course pages set out what the term courses cover if February suits you better than January.

What about the three shorter breaks?

Two weeks each, and they do a different job from the summer. The mid-year breaks are recovery rather than opportunity, and they sit at points in the year where a student is usually most tired.

The autumn break follows Term 1, which is the longest term of the year at about ten weeks. For senior students it lands before the serious assessment of Term 2 and is the most useful of the three for catching up.

The winter break for Year 12 students sits immediately after the Trial examinations, which is why it is the one break where senior families most often add structure. For everyone else it is a fortnight in the coldest part of the year and rest is the right default.

The spring break is the last before the summer, and for Year 12 it is the final stretch before the HSC written examinations. For younger years it is the quietest of the four.

What do the holidays mean for each year group?

The same six weeks do quite different work depending on where a child is in the schooling years, and the breaks that matter most are not the same ones for a Year 4 student and a Year 12 student.

Year 11 is the one that surprises families. Senior courses in NSW begin in Term 4 of Year 11 rather than at the start of Year 12, so by the time the summer break arrives a Year 11 student is already several weeks into their HSC year. The summer holiday is not a gap between years for them. It is a pause partway through a course.

For students sitting the Opportunity Class or Selective High School tests, the calendar that governs is the test calendar rather than the school one. Application windows and test dates are set by the NSW Department of Education and they do not move for your family’s holiday plans. Our Opportunity Class and Selective School test pages set out what each test involves, and the department’s own site carries the current windows.

For Year 12 families, the summer break before Year 12 does the most work, because it sits before the year rather than inside it. The Year 11 and Year 12 course pages explain how the senior courses are structured across the year.

How do the school holidays line up with the Matrix calendar?

They do not line up, and that is deliberate. Matrix terms run nine weeks and open at or near the start of a school term, but they teach the next school term’s content. The academic year opens in October rather than February for that reason.

What this means in practice is that a Matrix holiday course sits inside a school holiday, while a Matrix term sits across a school term teaching material the school has not reached yet. A family reading the two calendars side by side sometimes assumes the dates are an error. They are not.

The practical consequence for a parent is that enrolment decisions for the following school year get made in October, not in January. Families who wait until the week before school starts are deciding about a Matrix term that opened three months earlier. The NSW term dates page lists both calendars together.

What do families get wrong about the NSW calendar?

There are four things that could catch families unaware:

1. Reading the holiday end date as the return date. The summer holidays end on 27 January 2027 and students return on 3 February. Those are different dates and the gap is development days.
2. Assuming all NSW schools match. These are government school dates. Independent and Catholic schools set their own, and they commonly start a few days earlier or later. Your school’s own calendar is the one that governs.
3. Booking the last week of Term 4. Term 4 2027 ends on Monday 20 December, which is late, and flights and accommodation in that week are priced accordingly. Taking a child out before the end of term is a school-level decision, not a departmental one, so ask the school rather than assuming.
4. Treating the six-week summer as one block. It is three: a tired fortnight, a middle stretch where a child is rested enough to do something useful, and a last week that is better spent getting ready for February than starting anything new.

For the Matrix calendar alongside the school one, the NSW term dates page lists every course start date for the year.

Planning the summer, week by week

Six weeks is long enough that it needs a shape, and short enough that a shape imposed too tightly ruins it. The version below works for most families and it is deliberately light.

The fortnight from 18 December. Nothing. Children finishing Term 4 are usually more tired than they look, and December holds Christmas, travel and late nights. Work attempted in this fortnight tends to be work done badly.

The first full week of January. Reading restarts, and for younger children the short maths habit restarts with it. Ten minutes, not an hour. This is also the week to find out what your child actually struggled with last year, which is a conversation rather than a test.

The middle fortnight. If a holiday course is going to happen, this is where it fits. Matrix January courses begin on 11 January for that reason: far enough past Christmas that children are rested, far enough before February that what they cover is still fresh.

The last week before school. Practical rather than academic. Uniforms, equipment, sleep schedules moved back toward school time, and for high school students a look at the timetable and the texts. Starting something new in this week is a reliable way to arrive at February already behind on it.

The one thing worth protecting throughout is sleep. A child who has drifted to a 1am bedtime across six weeks will spend most of February recovering, and that costs more than any holiday course gains.

Frequently asked questions

When do NSW school holidays start in December 2026?

NSW government school summer holidays begin on Friday 18 December 2026 for Eastern Division students, which is the last day of Term 4 2026. Students return for Term 1 on Wednesday 3 February 2027. Independent and Catholic schools set their own dates and often differ by a few days.

When does school go back in NSW in 2027?

Eastern Division students return on Wednesday 3 February 2027. Western Division students, in the far west of the state, return on Wednesday 10 February 2027. The days between 28 January and 2 February are school development days, when staff attend and students do not.

How long are the NSW summer school holidays?

About six weeks. In 2026 to 2027 they run from Friday 18 December to Wednesday 27 January, with students returning on Wednesday 3 February after the development days. The three other NSW school holiday periods, in autumn, winter and spring, are two weeks each.

Are school development days part of the school holidays?

Not officially, but students do not attend them. Development days are staff planning and professional learning days scheduled at the start of most terms. For families they function as extra days at home, which is why the published holiday end date and the first day back are different dates.

When does the NSW school year end in 2027?

Monday 20 December 2027 is the last day for Eastern Division students in Term 4. The following summer holidays run from Tuesday 21 December 2027 to Friday 28 January 2028. Term 4 finishing on a Monday is worth noting if you are booking travel for the week before Christmas.

Try Matrix risk free

If a term course suits your family better than a holiday week, a free trial lesson lets your child sit in on a full Matrix class in their subject before you enrol. Term courses are backed by the First Lesson Money-Back Guarantee, so if the first lesson is not right you get a full refund.

Free trials apply to term courses. They do not cover holiday courses or Matrix+ online courses.