Diwali 2026: Sunday, 8 November — date, Lakshmi Puja muhurat & countdown

Diwali 2026 kab hai? When is Diwali 2026?

दिवाली 2026 कब है? इस साल दिवाली रविवार, 8 नवंबर को है — लक्ष्मी पूजा शाम 5:54 बजे से 7:50 बजे तक होगी (नई दिल्ली के अनुसार)।

Diwali 2026 falls on Sunday, November 8, the night of Kartik Amavasya — the darkest new-moon night of the Hindu lunar month of Kartik, which is exactly why lighting diyas matters so much: the festival literally means "row of lights" pushing back the year's deepest dark. If you've seen a different date on another site — some Western holiday calendars list November 9 — that's because they anchor the date to whichever day the Amavasya tithi is active at midnight, rather than at sunset. Panchang authorities, including DrikPanchang, use the Pradosh Kaal (evening twilight) method, which is what most Indian households, priests, and this page follow. That's the date your calendar should show, and it's the date we've verified live rather than carried over from last year.

Want the full breakdown of how this date is worked out, year to year? See our dedicated Diwali 2026 date & lunar calendar page.

Why the date moves every year

Diwali falls on Amavasya (the new moon) of the Hindu month of Kartik — a lunar date. A lunar month runs new-moon to new-moon, about 29.5 days, so twelve lunar months add up to roughly 354 days — about 11 days shorter than the solar year the Gregorian calendar uses. Left uncorrected, festivals would drift earlier every year and eventually cycle through every season, the way Ramadan does on the purely lunar Islamic calendar. To prevent that, the Hindu calendar periodically inserts an extra leap month, Adhik Maas, roughly once every 32–33 months — which is exactly why Diwali sometimes jumps by nearly a month from one year to the next, as it does moving from October 2025 to November 2026.

What muhurat actually means

Muhurat is a designated auspicious time window for starting an activity — derived from the position of the sun, moon, and rising sign (lagna) at that moment. For Lakshmi Puja specifically, the window that matters most is the overlap of two things: Pradosh Kaal (the twilight period just after sunset, when Goddess Lakshmi is traditionally believed to visit homes) and a "fixed" lagna — an astrological sign that doesn't shift once established, so its stability is thought to help wealth and prosperity stay put in the home rather than pass through. In 2026, that fixed-lagna window is Vrishabha (Taurus), active from 5:54 PM to 7:50 PM in New Delhi, sitting almost entirely inside the broader 5:31 PM–8:09 PM Pradosh Kaal window.

If the primary window isn't workable for your household, the same day offers a second fixed-lagna option — Kumbha Lagna, from 1:26 PM to 2:54 PM — and a late-night Simha Lagna window after midnight into November 9. None of these times are fixed constants; they shift by location because they depend on your local sunset. For the deeper Choghadiya breakdown, see ourdedicated Diwali muhurat page.

Quick questions