Punjab’s School Timings for Ramadan: The 2025 Schedule, the 2026 Schedule and How the Hours Are Set

The 2025 schedule

The announcement came in the last week of February 2025, a few days before the moon was sighted. According to press reports of the notification, the hours were as follows.

Single-shift schools

Double-shift schools

Many crowded schools in Punjab’s cities run two sets of pupils through the same building each day.

Two newspapers gave different closing times for the morning shift. Head teachers would have followed the wording of the notification itself.

Girls’ schools

Girls’ schools were told to open and close 15 minutes before the times above. The reason is practical. Where a girls’ school and a boys’ school stand close together, as they often do, staggering the bell avoids a crush at the gates and on the road.

The Ramadan timetable changes very little from year to year. What changes is the date it starts, and that is not known for certain until the moon is seen.

The 2026 schedule

In 2026 the fast began in the third week of February. A notification dated 16 February 2026 set out the hours.

The one difference worth noting is scope. Reports of the 2026 notice said plainly that all public and private schools in the province were to follow it.

In 2024 the single-shift hours were also 8:30am to 1:00pm, and that year’s notice listed Saturday as a school day.

How the decision is made

Who issues it

School hours in Punjab’s government schools are set by the School Education Department in Lahore, under a provincial minister and a secretary who is a senior civil servant. The department issues a short written order called a notification.

How it reaches a classroom

1. The secretary’s office signs the notification.
2. It is sent to the chief executive officers of the District Education Authorities, one in each district.
3. They pass it to the heads of the schools.
4. It is posted on the department’s social media accounts, which is where most parents and reporters first see it.

Why it comes so late

The Islamic calendar follows the moon. A month begins when the new crescent is seen, and Pakistan’s official moon-sighting committee meets on the evening before. So the department knows roughly, not exactly, when Ramadan will start. Its orders usually say that the new hours take effect “from the first of Ramadan”, whenever that turns out to be.

Does it bind private schools?

Private schools in Punjab are registered with the district authorities and are expected to follow the department’s instructions on holidays and hours. In practice many large private chains set their own Ramadan timings, usually close to the official ones. Parents of children in private schools should look for a notice from the school itself.

Why the school day is shortened

No law requires it. The practice is long established and has three reasons behind it.

The staff are fasting. Almost all teachers, and all the older pupils, go without food and water from before dawn until sunset. By early afternoon concentration falls. A shorter day ends before the hardest hours.

The household rhythm changes. Families wake before dawn for the pre-fast meal, pray, and often sleep again briefly. Evenings are taken up with breaking the fast and with long night prayers. Children sleep later and less.

Travel. In the last hour before sunset the roads are at their most hurried and most dangerous. Getting children and teachers home by early afternoon keeps them out of it.

What is lost

A shorter day means less teaching. Over a month, a school that normally runs six hours loses roughly a quarter of its lessons. Schools deal with this in different ways.

Education researchers have long pointed out that Pakistani pupils already receive fewer hours of teaching in a year than those in most countries, once summer and winter holidays, smog closures, examination duty and unplanned shutdowns are counted. Ramadan is one more subtraction, though a predictable one.

A year of changing bells

The Ramadan order is only one of several the department issues each year.

Parents sometimes complain that the timetable seems to change every few weeks. In a province with a climate that runs from freezing fog to 45 degrees, and a calendar that follows the moon, some of that is unavoidable.

Examinations in Ramadan

Because the Islamic year is about eleven days shorter than the solar one, Ramadan moves earlier each year. In 2025 and 2026 it fell in late winter, which is also the season of annual examinations.

• In Punjab the examination boards hold the matriculation examinations in March. In 2025 these began during the fast.
• School-based annual examinations for lower classes are also held in March.

Examination timings are set by the boards, not by the school-hours notification. Papers are usually held in the morning. Candidates who are fasting sit them like everyone else; there is no separate arrangement.

For the next few years Ramadan will fall in February and then January, which is the middle of the school term in Punjab and before the main examinations.

Colleges, universities and offices

Schools are not the only institutions that change their hours.

Colleges. Government colleges in Punjab come under a separate department, for higher education, which issues its own notice. In recent years it has followed the schools closely: a start at about 8:30am and a finish by 1:00pm or 1:30pm.

Universities. Each university sets its own timetable. Most shorten lectures, drop evening classes or move them to after the night prayers.

Government offices. The federal and provincial governments announce reduced office hours for the month, typically ending at about 2:30pm or 3pm, earlier on Fridays. This matters to parents because it decides whether anyone is free to collect a child at one o’clock.

Banks. The State Bank announces shorter banking hours, and the banks follow.

Private business. Shops and markets open late and stay open far into the night, especially in the last ten days before Eid.

The effect is that the whole working day of the province shifts for a month. For families the awkward gap is the afternoon: children home by half past one, offices open until three, and the household busy with preparations for the evening meal.

What teachers say

The timetable is written for pupils, but it is teachers who have to make it work, and their view is seldom reported.

• The short day helps. Teaching five or six classes of forty or more children while fasting is tiring by any standard. Most teachers welcome the earlier finish.
• The syllabus does not shrink. The same course has to be covered in fewer hours, often with examinations approaching. Head teachers are judged on results whatever the month.
• Other duties continue. Government teachers are routinely pulled out of classrooms for census work, election duty, vaccination drives and examination supervision. Ramadan does not exempt them.
• Travel is harder. Many women teachers in rural Punjab travel long distances by shared van. An earlier close gets them home before the roads become frantic.
• Double shifts are the hardest. A teacher on the afternoon shift finishes at four o’clock and may reach home only just before sunset.

A point sometimes made is that when the fast falls in winter, as it does now, the pre-dawn meal is later and the day shorter, so the strain on staff and pupils is less than in the long summer fasts of a decade ago. The shortened hours have stayed the same regardless.

What other provinces do

Education is a provincial subject. Each province issues its own Ramadan hours.

The hours differ a little from place to place. Sindh, for example, has usually set separate timings for primary and secondary classes. The principle is the same everywhere: start a little later, finish by early afternoon, shorten Friday.

Advice for parents

General suggestions, not medical advice.

If your child is fasting

Young children are not required to fast. Many begin with a few fasts, or half-days, from the age of about seven to ten, and build up.

• Do not skip the pre-dawn meal. Slow-release foods, such as whole-grain bread, eggs, yoghurt and lentils, last longer than sweet ones.
• Water. Encourage plenty between sunset and dawn.
• Sleep. An afternoon rest after school makes up for the short night.
• Tell the teacher if a young child is fasting for the first time.
• Stop the fast if a child becomes unwell, dizzy or very weak. A child with diabetes or another medical condition should fast only on a doctor’s advice.

If your child is not fasting

• Send a snack and water as usual. Schools do not forbid younger children from eating.
• Teach them to eat discreetly out of consideration for those who are fasting.

Practical points

After Eid

The shortened day ends with the month. The order of events is usually this.

1. The last days of Ramadan. Attendance thins as families travel to their home towns. Some schools close a day or two early.
2. Eid holidays. The provincial government, not the education department, announces the public holidays for Eid, normally three days, sometimes stretched to a long weekend.
3. Reopening. Schools return to their ordinary seasonal timings on the first working day after the holiday. No fresh notification is needed for that; the Ramadan order simply lapses.
4. Summer timings. A few weeks later, as the weather warms, a separate order moves the start of the day earlier.

Parents are sometimes caught out by the third step. A child who has grown used to finishing at one o’clock is back to the full day the morning after the Eid break.

Looking ahead to 2027

Ramadan in 2027 is expected to begin around 8 February, give or take a day, depending on the moon.

If the department follows its habit, parents can expect:

• an announcement in the first week of February 2027;
• single-shift hours of about 8:30am to 1:00pm, closing at 12:30pm on Fridays;
• girls’ schools 15 minutes earlier;
• Eid holidays around 9 to 12 March 2027, announced separately by the provincial government.

None of that is official until it is notified.

Words used in this article

Timeline

For how provincial governments work and what they control, read our guide to Pakistan’s politics.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

• The News, “Punjab education dept releases new school timings for Ramadan” — 25 February 2025.
• ARY News, “School timings for Ramadan 2025 announced” — February 2025.
• Pakistan Observer, “Ramazan 2025 timings for schools in Pakistan: full schedule here” — 2025.
• TechJuice, “Punjab announces Ramadan school timings 2026 for all schools” — February 2026.
• Pakistan Observer, “Ramadan 2026 school timings in Punjab: check update” — February 2026.
• Daily Pakistan, “Punjab announces school timings for Ramazan 2024” — 11 March 2024.
• School Education Department, Government of the Punjab — for official notifications.