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Malta Village Festas
June to September 2027 · Parishes across Malta and Gozo
Add the four days to your plan
Submit a photo
June to September 2027 · Parishes across Malta and Gozo
Add the four days to your planFrom June to September, a Sunday in Malta usually puts you near a parish carrying its saint through the streets behind a marching band. The weekend to build a trip around is Santa Marija: fireworks over Mosta's dome on the eve, then the statue out of the church on the evening of 15 August.
Event guide, Malta. Meridian Dispatch.
Santa Marija falls on Sunday 15 August in 2027. The Archdiocese publishes the full parish list on church.mt before the season.
The season runs from June to September 2027, and Santa Marija falls on Sunday 15 August 2027. Most parishes keep the same Sunday every year, and a handful of feasts keep a fixed date, marked in the Festa Finder on this page.
A festa is a parish's annual feast for its saint or for Our Lady. It lasts from three days to about a week, with concerts, band marches, firework displays and bell ringing. On the final day the clergy lead a statue in procession, with parish members and marching bands. UNESCO added the Maltese village festa to its Intangible Cultural Heritage list in 2023.
Santa Marija on 15 August is a national holiday and the Feast of the Assumption. Eight parishes keep it that day: Birkirkara (St Mary), Gudja, Attard, Għaxaq, Mosta, Mqabba and Qrendi on Malta, and Victoria on Gozo. Each runs its own programme of marches, fireworks and a procession.
For fireworks, the strongest nights are Mosta and Mqabba on the eve of Santa Marija, Saturday 14 August 2027. In other weeks, the Festa Finder on this page shows which feasts fall in a visitor's dates.
From a public viewing area, following local safety instructions. At Mosta that is Pjazza Rotunda; at Mqabba, the Qrendi bypass or Santa Marija Convoy Street; at Għaxaq, the vantage point on Valletta Road.
Mosta's Santa Marija procession leaves the church from about 7pm on 15 August, and the mechanised ground display is fired outside the church around 11:30pm on the eve, 14 August.
At the parish office of the feast concerned, whose telephone number the Archdiocese of Malta prints beside each feast on its annual list. The office can give the hour and the route of a procession as well as the date.
Very loud, and petards are fired by day as well as by night through the festa week. Anyone with tinnitus or sensitive hearing should watch from further off.
Malta Public Transport posts route diversions on its service updates page, and the Tallinja app shows routes and return times. Visitors staying late should check the last bus home and keep a taxi as the second plan.
Yes. Gozo has feasts from June to September, among them Nadur on 29 June, Victoria on 15 August and Xagħra on 8 September. Visitors based on Malta need to allow for the crossing, above all in August.
Tap the weeks you are on the islands: each square is a week, named by its Sunday, and each gold mark is a feast. Most parishes keep the same Sunday every year, and the fixed feasts keep their date: 29 June, 16 July, 6 and 10 August, 15 August and 8 September. Before you book around one of the others, check its date on the church.mt list.
9 to 15 August: 9 feasts
Match the saint as well as the town: Mosta, Valletta and others hold more than one feast.
Of all the weeks, mid-August has the most fire. Eight parishes keep Santa Marija on the same day, and Mosta does it under one of the largest unsupported church domes in Europe.
Three nights. Fri 13 to Mon 16 Aug. See inside the Rotunda on Saturday, stay in Mosta for the eve, and keep Sunday evening for the procession.
A festa runs from three days to about a week. Concerts, band marches and bell ringing build towards the last day, which is kept for the statue.
In the week before Santa Marija, Mosta fires its petards at 8am and at noon. The parish programme, with the year's exact hours, comes out in the first days of August.
Be in Pjazza Rotunda, in front of the domed church, for the evening. The band marches up Triq il-Kbira, through the square and along Triq il-Kungress Ewkaristiku, then back to the square, so you can hold one spot and let it come to you.
Food stalls line the way, and Maltese nougat is the sweet to buy.
See inside the Rotunda on Saturday afternoon. It is shut to sightseers on 15 August.
Mosta, Mqabba and Għaxaq all fire on the eve, Saturday 14 August. Pick one sky, and watch it from a public viewing area.
The mechanised ground display, around 11:30pm, fired in front of the church. Hold your place in Pjazza Rotunda.
About 35 minutes set to music, ending in the Tower of Light. Watch from the Qrendi bypass or Santa Marija Convoy Street.
A display set to music from about 9pm, then ground fireworks around 11pm. Watch from Valletta Road, just outside the town.
Santa Marija is a national holiday. Keep the hot afternoon for the sea or your room, because the night runs late.
In Mosta, the statue leaves the church from about 7pm, and the band greets it with the Ave Maria. The band then plays Marian hymns beside the procession as far as Triq it-Torri.
Stand on Triq it-Torri and you have the statue and the band in front of you together. The band then marches off to its club, and the night closes with a Marian concert on the basilica's forecourt.
The day after the feast brings the worst traffic of the Santa Marija weekend. Give the airport run extra time.
Going on to Gozo instead? Ferry queues can run to hours in August, so plan the crossing as half a day.
Comfortable shoes and cash for the stalls. Carry water too, since the August heat is the main hazard after the crowds.
The car. Roads near the village centre close and cars park outside it, so take the bus or a taxi.
Band club rivalry sometimes boils over, so stand back from a dense march.
Mdina is about ten minutes from Mosta by car or taxi. Our pick is The Xara Palace Relais & Châteaux, inside the walls on Misrah il-Kunsill, past the point where visitor cars stop. Book well ahead for mid-August.
The walled city, about ten minutes from Mosta.
Four feasts of its own across the summer.
St Laurence's feast, on 10 August.
Gozo keeps the Assumption on 15 August.
The Nativity of Our Lady, on 8 September.
Add the four days to your plan and the app keeps each stop and its time with you.
The official pages this guide was checked against.
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