Janmashtami 2027: the birth of Krishna at midnight
Janmashtami is the birthday of Krishna, kept on the eighth day of the dark half of the month, at midnight. In Maharashtra it is Gokulashtami, and the next day is Dahi Handi.
When it falls next
Janmashtami in each region
What Janmashtami is
Krishna was born at midnight in a prison cell in Mathura, to Devaki and Vasudeva, and was carried that night across the flooded Yamuna to Gokul, where Yashoda and Nanda raised him. The festival keeps that night.
He is worshipped as the eighth avatar of Vishnu in the tradition, the playful child of Gokul who stole butter, the friend of the gopis, and the teacher of the Bhagavad Gita.
Dahi Handi, the day after, remembers the child who stole butter from pots hung high, and young people climb on each other's shoulders to break a pot of curd hung across the street.
How families keep it at home
Many keep a fast through the day and night, eating once after midnight. The puja ghar is decorated with flowers, a small cradle is set, and children dress as Krishna and Radha.
At midnight the image of the infant Krishna is bathed in panchamrit, milk, curd, ghee, honey and sugar, dressed, and laid in the cradle. The family sings and rocks the cradle, and the fast is opened with prasad.
The prasad is often panjiri, gopalkala of flattened rice with curd and cucumber in Maharashtra, makhan-mishri, and sweets of milk.
How it differs by region
In Maharashtra, Gokulashtami is followed by Dahi Handi, with the gopalkala shared from the broken pot.
In Mathura and Vrindavan the festival runs for days, with the Raslila performed in the temples.
In the south many homes draw small footprints from the door to the puja ghar, as if the child Krishna had walked in, and keep the day as Krishna Jayanti or Ashtami Rohini.
How its date is set
Janmashtami is the ashtami of the dark half of Shravan where months end at the new moon (amanta, as in Maharashtra) and of Bhadrapada where they end at the full moon. It is kept on the night the ashtami holds at midnight, the nishita.
Where the ashtami and the nakshatra Rohini meet, the tradition counts the night as especially auspicious, and some communities keep the festival on the day of Rohini instead.
Read the Krishna aarti and Madhurashtakam.