Western Easter
Sunday, April 1, 2018
Gregorian computus. Golden number 5, epact 13, Paschal full moon March 31.
Easter 2018
Easter 2018: Sunday, April 1
In 2018 Western Easter, reckoned in the Gregorian calendar, falls on Sunday, April 1, 2018. Orthodox Easter (Pascha), reckoned in the Julian calendar, falls on Sunday, April 8, 2018, one week later.
Orthodox Easter
Sunday, April 8, 2018
Julian computus: March 26 in the Julian calendar, plus 13 days to reach the Gregorian calendar.
In 2018 the two Easters are 7 days apart: Orthodox Easter is one week after Western Easter. They last fell on the same day in 2017 (April 16). They next fall on the same day in 2025 (April 20).
Western · Apr 1
Orthodox · Apr 8
MarchAprilMayThe moving feasts of 2018
Western feasts, 2018
| Feast | Date | From Easter |
|---|---|---|
| Shrove Tuesday | Tuesday, February 13, 2018 | −47 days |
| Ash Wednesday | Wednesday, February 14, 2018 | −46 days |
| Palm Sunday | Sunday, March 25, 2018 | −7 days |
| Maundy Thursday | Thursday, March 29, 2018 | −3 days |
| Good Friday | Friday, March 30, 2018 | −2 days |
| Holy Saturday | Saturday, March 31, 2018 | −1 day |
| Easter Sunday | Sunday, April 1, 2018 | Easter Sunday |
| Easter Monday | Monday, April 2, 2018 | +1 day |
| Ascension Day | Thursday, May 10, 2018 | +39 days |
| Pentecost | Sunday, May 20, 2018 | +49 days |
Orthodox feasts, 2018
| Feast | Date | From Easter |
|---|---|---|
| Clean Monday | Monday, February 19, 2018 | −48 days |
| Palm Sunday | Sunday, April 1, 2018 | −7 days |
| Great and Holy Friday | Friday, April 6, 2018 | −2 days |
| Pascha (Easter Sunday) | Sunday, April 8, 2018 | Easter Sunday |
| Ascension | Thursday, May 17, 2018 | +39 days |
| Pentecost | Sunday, May 27, 2018 | +49 days |
Each date is Easter Sunday plus or minus a fixed number of days; the offsets and their sources are on the about page. Observance varies by church and by country. Whether a feast is a day off work is a matter of each country’s law: Holidays lists each country’s public holidays, off the open Nager.Date database.
How early is Easter in 2018?
April 1 is date 11 of the 35 that Western Easter can take, March 22 to April 25: 10 days after the earliest possible date and 24 days before the latest. Of the 201 Easters from 1900 to 2100, 45 fall on an earlier date than this one and 149 fall on a later date. 6 other years in that span share the date: 1923, 1934, 1945, 1956, 2029, 2040. Before 2018, Western Easter last fell on April 1 in 1956; after 2018 it next does in 2029.
In the 2010s Western Easter ran from March 27 (2016) to April 24 (2011); 2018’s April 1 is the third-earliest of the ten. Across the twenty-first century (2001–2100) Western Easter falls on April 1 in 3 years, and the Western and Orthodox Easters share a Sunday in 31 years.
Orthodox Easter on April 8 is March 26 in the Julian calendar; 13 days carry it to the Gregorian calendar in 2018. From 1900 to 2100 Orthodox Easter falls on an earlier Gregorian date in 11 years and on a later one in 184 years; it falls on the same date in 1923, 1934, 2007, 2029, 2091.
The earliest and latest Easters from 1900 to 2100, with how often each date occurs, are on their own page.
The arithmetic for 2018
5Golden number: the year’s place in the 19-year cycle of the moon, (2018 mod 19) + 1.
13Gregorian epact: the age of the reckoned moon at the start of the year.
March 31Paschal full moon of the Gregorian reckoning, a Saturday. Easter is the Sunday after it.
April 4Paschal full moon of the Julian reckoning in Gregorian dates (Julian March 22), a Wednesday.
The two algorithms, worked for 2018
- Western: the Anonymous Gregorian algorithm
a=4 b=20 c=18 d=5 e=0 f=1 g=6 h=10 i=4 k=2 l=0 m=0h + l − 7m + 114 = 124, and 124 ÷ 31 = 4 remainder 0: month 4, day 0 + 1. April 1- Orthodox: Meeus’s Julian algorithm
a=2 b=2 c=4 d=1 e=3d + e + 114 = 118, and 118 ÷ 31 = 3 remainder 25: Julian March 26. Plus 13 days: April 8
How the date of Easter is calculated explains each letter. The dates on this page agree with the US Census Bureau table (Western), the 5ko.free.fr tables (Western and Orthodox), Wikipedia’s list of dates for Easter (Western and Orthodox), each read September 28, 2026.