DigiNepal · festivals
Qingming Festival (Tomb Sweeping Day) (清明节 (Chinese)). Region: China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Macau, Malaysia, Singapore. Tradition: Chinese cultural. Calendar: Solar term (sun at 15 degrees ecliptic longitude). Dates: China 2026: Sunday 5 April 2026 [official, source CN]; China 2027: Monday 5 April 2027 [official, source CN]; China 2028: Tuesday 4 April 2028 [official, source CN]. History and significance: Qingming, meaning clear and bright, is one of the 24 solar terms and falls around 4 or 5 April. Families visit ancestral graves to clean them, offer food and burn incense and joss paper. It also celebrates spring with kite flying and outings. The festival absorbed the older Cold Food Festival in which no fires were lit. Key rituals and foods: Tomb sweeping, ancestor offerings, kite flying, spring outings; foods include qingtuan green rice dumplings. Date basis: official = matches a government gazetted holiday list; computed = calculated from the calendar system (tithi astronomy with skyfield and JPL DE421, Hijri Umm al-Qura, Chinese, Korean and Hebrew calendar libraries, or the fixed rule); expected = Umm al-Qura projection pending moon sighting. Sources: Wikipedia and Wikidata (CC BY-SA, CC0) and government holiday lists, summarised in our own words.