Mother's Day 2027

Mother's Day has its date written into federal law, yet it lands on a different date almost every year. The reason is that the law names a weekday, not a day of the month. This page shows how that rule produces May 9 in 2027, lists the dates for the years around it and tells the story of how a West Virginia memorial service became a national day. To count the days to it from any starting point, use the Countdown Calculator.

Why Mother's Day is May 9 in 2027

The second Sunday in May is always the first Sunday on or after May 8, so the date depends only on the weekday of May 1. With Sunday counted as 0 and Saturday as 6, the day of the month is:

May 1, 2027 is a Saturday, so w = 6 and the day is 8 + ((7 − 6) mod 7) = 8 + 1 = 9. Check it on a calendar: Saturday, May 1 is followed by the first Sunday on May 2 and the second on May 9. When May 1 is itself a Sunday, the formula gives May 8, the earliest possible date; when May 1 is a Monday, it gives May 14, the latest. That second case is exactly what happens in 2028, when Mother's Day falls on May 14.

Mother's Day dates from 2023 to 2032

The table pairs each Mother's Day with Father's Day, the third Sunday in June. The gap between them is five weeks in most years and six weeks when Mother's Day falls early in its range, as it does in 2027.

Mother's Day falls on May 9 in 2004, 2010, 2021, 2027, 2032, 2038, 2049, 2055, 2060 within the years 2000 to 2060. The pattern is irregular because leap years shift the weekday of May 1 by two days instead of one.

How often each date comes around

The Gregorian calendar repeats exactly every 400 years, so counting one full cycle shows how often each of the seven possible dates occurs. The spread is nearly even, and May 9 turns out to be one of the two least common dates.

The law behind the date

Mother's Day is codified at 36 U.S.C. 117, in the part of the U.S. Code that lists patriotic and national observances. Subsection (a) is a single sentence: "The second Sunday in May is Mother's Day." Subsection (b) requests the President to issue a proclamation calling on government officials to display the flag on all government buildings, and on the people to display it at their homes, as a public expression of love and reverence for the mothers of the United States. The wording goes back to a resolution approved on May 8, 1914. Father's Day received the same treatment later: 36 U.S.C. 109, drawn from a 1972 law, sets the third Sunday in June.

Neither day is one of the 11 legal public holidays in 5 U.S.C. 6103, so neither gives anyone a day off. In practice that hardly matters, since both always fall on a Sunday.

A short history of Mother's Day

The day began as one daughter's tribute. Ann Reeves Jarvis of West Virginia organized Mothers' Day Work Clubs that, according to the National Park Service, cared for sick and injured soldiers from both sides of the Civil War. After she died in 1905, her daughter Anna Jarvis set out to create a day honoring mothers. On May 10, 1908, the first observances took place at Andrews Methodist Episcopal Church in Grafton, West Virginia, and in Philadelphia. Anna Jarvis attended the Philadelphia event and sent 500 white carnations to the Grafton service.

The idea spread quickly. The Library of Congress notes that West Virginia passed a law designating the holiday in 1910 and other states followed. On May 8, 1914, Congress passed the resolution naming the second Sunday in May as Mother's Day, and on May 9, 1914, President Woodrow Wilson issued the first national proclamation. The first national Mother's Day was therefore Sunday, May 10, 1914.

Jarvis did not like what came next. The National Park Service records that she criticized florists for raising carnation prices before the holiday and rejected greeting cards as against the spirit of the day. She died in West Chester, Pennsylvania, in 1948.

Mother's Day in other countries

The American date is common but not universal. Canada and Australia also use the second Sunday in May, so their 2027 date is May 9 as well. The United Kingdom keeps Mothering Sunday on the fourth Sunday of Lent, three weeks before Easter, which in 2027 is Sunday, March 7, 2027. Mexico celebrates on a fixed date, May 10, which falls on a Monday in 2027, one day after the American holiday. Anyone sending a card abroad should check the local date first.

Spring 2027 around Mother's Day

Mother's Day 2027 sits between two other moving dates. Easter comes early, on March 28, and Orthodox Easter on May 2, the Sunday before Mother's Day. Memorial Day follows on Monday, May 31, and Father's Day on June 20. The full sequence, with federal holidays shaded, is on the 2027 calendar, and the Date Calculator finds the gap between any two of these dates.

Sources

• U.S. Government Publishing Office: 36 U.S.C. 117, Mother's Day and 36 U.S.C. 109, Father's Day (United States Code, 2024 edition, with the 1914 and 1972 source laws).
• Library of Congress: Mother's Day: Topics in Chronicling America (timeline of 1908, 1910 and 1914).
• National Park Service: Anna Maria Jarvis.
• U.S. Census Bureau: Mother's Day stories and facts.