THE PAGAN WHEEL OF THE YEAR AND THE 8 SABBATS

The Wheel of the Year does not count years the way a calendar counts them, so there is no numbered wheel to be in. The Wheel of the Year for 2026 is the same cycle of eight sabbats as every other year, and only the solar dates shift, by a day or two, listed above. The Wheel is a circle with no beginning and no end, so a new year can start anywhere on it. Many count the new year from Yule, when the light returns on the longest night, while the last harvest at Samhain is the Witches' New Year and when the dark half of the year begins.

Four sabbats sit on fixed dates: Samhain on October 31, Imbolc on February 1, Beltane on May 1, and Lammas on August 1. The other four follow the sun and shift by a day or two each year: Yule on the winter solstice around December 20 to 23, Ostara on the spring equinox around March 19 to 22, Litha on the summer solstice around June 20 to 22, and Mabon on the autumn equinox around September 21 to 23. Each sabbat's own page carries the current year's date.

The sabbats go in this order: Samhain, Yule, Imbolc, Ostara, Beltane, Litha, Lammas, and Mabon, and then the Wheel begins again. Samhain is the Witches' New Year and the start of the cycle, but the circle has no true beginning and any festival can be the first one celebrated. Roughly six to seven weeks pass between one sabbat and the next.

The cross-quarter days are the four sabbats that fall between the solstices and equinoxes: Samhain, Imbolc, Beltane, and Lammas. They keep fixed calendar dates while the solar sabbats shift by a day or two with the sun, and they descend from the four seasonal festivals of the Gaelic year, which is why they are often called the fire festivals. Samhain and Beltane also divide the year into its two halves, the dark half of indoor celebrations and the light half of outdoor ones.

The Wheel of the Year as a full cycle of eight sabbats is roughly seventy years old, arranged in the twentieth century, though the festivals it joins are far older. Samhain, Imbolc, Beltane, and Lughnasadh are named as seasonal festivals of the medieval Irish year, and the solstices and equinoxes have carried celebrations across Europe for as long as anyone wrote them down. That makes the Wheel a genuine living tradition rather than an unbroken ancient one.

Pagans in the Southern Hemisphere turn the Wheel to match their own sky, so each sabbat is celebrated six months from its Northern date. Yule falls in June when the southern nights are longest, Litha falls in December, and the harvest festivals follow the southern harvest. The Wheel belongs to the seasons rather than to the calendar, and it works anywhere the seasons turn.

The Wheel of the Year is pagan, and it is celebrated across many pagan paths rather than belonging to one. Wiccans, Druids, Heathens, eclectic pagans, and solitary witches who belong to none all follow versions of it, and each tradition keeps its own emphasis. The Wheel itself asks nothing beyond celebrating the seasons as they turn.

Not all witches follow the Wheel of the Year, and nothing requires it. Many witches celebrate all eight sabbats, some celebrate only the ones that suit their practice or their climate, and some follow other calendars entirely. The Wheel is an invitation rather than an obligation, and a witch who celebrates two festivals well is following it as truly as one who celebrates all eight.

Anyone can celebrate the Wheel of the Year, and no initiation, membership, or declaration is required. The Wheel is kept by pagans and witches, but its festivals celebrate the seasons themselves, and many people begin by adding one or two sabbat traditions alongside the holidays they already keep.