Sunday Shopping in December 2026: Which Swiss Towns Open, and on Which Sundays

Sunday shopping in Switzerland is a cantonal matter, not a national one. Article 19 paragraph 6 of the Labour Act lets a canton designate at most four Sundays a year on which sales staff may work without a permit. In canton Zurich each municipality sets its own days; in Basel-Stadt, canton Bern and Ticino the canton issues one ruling for its whole territory. The four Advent Sundays in 2026 are 29 November, then 6, 13 and 20 December. The table below carries only what we could read on an official cantonal or communal publication.

Last updated: September 2026. Sources: canton Zurich, "Sonntagsverkäufe", the list of days reported by the municipalities for 2026 (zh.ch, retrieved 5 September 2026); municipality of Regensdorf, Abteilung Sicherheit, "Sonntagsverkäufe 2026", 1 December 2025; canton Basel-Stadt, Amt für Wirtschaft und Arbeit, labour inspectorate, publication of the dates under paragraph 4a para. 1 RLG, 11 February 2026; canton Bern, Amt für Wirtschaft, ruling on permit-free Sunday work in retail for 2026, 8 September 2025; canton Schwyz, Amt für Arbeit; canton Ticino, Dipartimento delle finanze e dell'economia, permits published in the Foglio ufficiale of 24 February 2026 (ti.ch); canton Geneva, Council of State communiqué of 14 June 2026 (ge.ch), both retrieved 6 September 2026. Cities whose dates we could not confirm on an official page are deliberately absent from the table.

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When are the Advent Sundays in 2026?

Christmas Day 2026 falls on a Friday. That puts the four Advent Sundays on 29 November, 6 December, 13 December and 20 December 2026. The Sunday between Christmas and New Year is 27 December, and a few municipalities use precisely that date as their fourth trading Sunday.

One detail that costs wasted trips every year: 14 and 21 December 2026 are Mondays, not Sundays. Any list showing those two dates is repeating the 2025 calendar. Before you set off, check that the date you were given actually falls on a Sunday in 2026.

How many Sunday openings are allowed?

The ceiling is federal. Under Article 19 paragraph 6 of the Labour Act, cantons may designate at most four Sundays a year on which employees in retail shops may be employed without a permit. That is how the reasoning of the canton Bern ruling of 8 September 2025 puts it, and the Basel publication of 11 February 2026 rests on the same provision.

How a canton spends those four days is then its own business. Zurich delegates them to the municipalities: every Zurich municipality may designate at most four Sundays or public holidays a year permit-free, with at most two consecutive Sundays, and the exemption covers sales staff only, not other categories of employee (zh.ch). Canton Schwyz allows four public rest days a year, of which at most two may fall on Sundays or statutory holidays, usually in Advent (sz.ch). Basel-Stadt set only two dates for 2026.

For staff the federal rules are the same everywhere: nobody may be assigned to Sunday work without their consent (Art. 19 para. 5 ArG), the wage supplement is 50 percent (Art. 19 para. 3 ArG), and under-18s may not work these openings (Art. 31 para. 4 ArG, cited in the Basel ruling).

Sunday shopping 2026: the confirmed dates by town

What stands out is how little the lists have in common. Zurich puts three of its four days in Advent and one on 31 May. Wetzikon and Regensdorf spend two on winter and spring dates, Hinwil uses 25 October. Bülach is the only municipality in this selection to have designated 27 December, the Sunday after Christmas. And Dübendorf reported no trading Sunday at all for 2026. The neighbouring municipality tells you nothing about yours. Ticino works the other way round: the canton authorises the days collectively for the whole retail trade, so the same three dates apply across the entire canton.

Four authorised dates do not mean four open shops

This is the most useful distinction on the page: the canton or the municipality permits, it obliges nobody. In canton Bern the limit is explicit. The ruling of 8 September 2025 states that, independently of labour-law provisions, retail shops and sales stands may open on at most two Sundays a year, from 10:00 to 18:00 (Art. 11 para. 2 HGG). A Bern shop therefore picks two of the designated dates rather than using them all.

In Basel-Stadt the circle of businesses is drawn tightly: the ruling of 11 February 2026 applies to sales premises, and it states that service businesses, hairdressers and nail studios in shopping centres for example, do not count as sales premises and may not employ staff on those dates. In Regensdorf the communal notice adds that no further applications can be granted for 2026.

In practice: the date tells you whether a shop would be allowed to open. Whether your branch actually opens, and until when, is on its own page in the retailer's store finder. For an ordinary Sunday with no authorised opening, a different provision of the Labour Act applies, and our guide to Sunday grocery shopping in Switzerland covers it. Public holidays are in the public holiday calendar, and weekday times in the guide to Swiss supermarket opening hours.

Which cities are missing here, and why

Bern city, Biel, Lucerne, St. Gallen, Zug and Lausanne are not in the table. Not because nothing happens there, but because we found no citable official 2026 publication. Those dates come from the cantonal employment office or labour inspectorate and appear in the official gazette, sometimes only in autumn. Until they do, we do not guess them.

Geneva is a special case, because the rule itself is new. On 14 June 2026 the electorate accepted, by close to 53 percent, an amendment to the shop opening hours act LHOM allowing shops to open on two Sundays a year in addition to 31 December; staff may be employed until 17.00, the work stays voluntary and the hours are paid double (ge.ch, 14 June 2026). Which two Sundays apply in 2026 is not published on that page, and no entry-into-force date is given there either, so Geneva stays out of the table.

If you want to check your own municipality, the shortest route is the municipal website with the keyword "Sonntagsverkauf", "ouverture dominicale" or "apertura domenicale", and failing that the page of the cantonal economy or labour office. Canton Zurich keeps one central list for all its municipalities; other cantons publish a single ruling covering the whole territory. Both carry an issue date, and that is exactly how you tell whether a list is for 2026 or still for 2025.

Do the weekly deals still apply on that Sunday?

Yes, and it is a calendar question rather than a Sunday question. Migros, Coop and Denner start their weekly Aktionen on Thursday and run them to the following Wednesday; Coop switched in the week of 21 January 2025, Migros and Denner followed on 5 February 2026. Aldi Suisse and Lidl Schweiz publish new offers twice a week, on Monday and Thursday. A trading Sunday therefore always sits in the middle of a running deal week.

For the two dates that Basel-Stadt and canton Bern have in common that means: on Sunday 13 December 2026 the prices that started on Thursday 10 December apply, and on Sunday 20 December those from Thursday 17 December. Prices change every Thursday, and which ones are running right now you see live in Rappn.

The plan for 13 and 20 December

It depends on your municipality, and that is the honest answer. Two municipalities in the same canton can pick different dates, and the same canton can set two days one year and four the next. What does not change: walk in unprepared and you buy what is there rather than what is on offer.

Rappn shows you all current offers from the seven chains, Migros, Coop, Aldi Suisse, Lidl, Denner, Aligro and Otto's, in four languages, filterable by canton and with the unit price next to the pack price. For the big pre-Christmas shop, our guide to Christmas grocery shopping in Switzerland completes this page.

Next step: first check on your municipality's website whether 13 or 20 December is a trading Sunday where you live. Then open the current offers, filter to your canton and set a price alert on the two or three things you know you need. Your list is then ready before Sunday arrives. Rappn is free, needs no account and is paid by no retailer.