New Year Traditions Around the World

Regions

Asia & Pacific

Japan 🇯🇵

New Year (Oshogatsu) is the most important holiday in Japan. Before it comes ōsōji, the year-end “big clean” of the home. On New Year's Eve, many Buddhist temples ring their bells 108 times at midnight in the Joya no Kane ceremony, once for each of the 108 earthly desires in Buddhist belief. Families eat toshikoshi soba (buckwheat noodles that mark the crossing from one year to the next) and osechi ryori (special dishes served in boxes), and visit a shrine or temple for Hatsumode, the first visit of the year. Tokyo's official tourism site says Meiji Shrine alone draws several million visitors between New Year's Eve and January 3.

China 🇨🇳

China observes January 1 as a public holiday, but the major celebration is Chinese New Year (Spring Festival), which falls between January 21 and February 20. Traditions include red envelopes (hongbao) of money given to younger relatives, dragon and lion dances, and firecrackers. According to legend, the monster Nian was afraid of the color red and of loud noises, which is why red is the color of good luck and why noise is made to scare away evil spirits.

South Korea 🇰🇷

Seoul rings in the New Year at the Bosingak bell in Jongno, which is struck 33 times at midnight in a ceremony first held in 1953; the 33 strikes stand for the 33 realms of Buddhist cosmology. Koreans also celebrate Seollal (Lunar New Year) separately: children bow to their elders (sebae) and families eat tteokguk (rice cake soup), which is said to add a year to one's age.

Australia & New Zealand 🇦🇺🇳🇿

Both countries celebrate in the middle of summer. Sydney's fireworks over the harbour drew nearly a million people on New Year's Eve 2025, by the City of Sydney's estimate, and audiences around the world watch; Auckland launches its fireworks from the Sky Tower at midnight. Many Australians and New Zealanders celebrate outdoors with barbecues, beach parties and public fireworks.

Thailand 🇹🇭

Thailand celebrates both January 1 and Songkran, the Thai New Year, on April 13–15. For January 1, Bangkok has held a large countdown at CentralWorld in recent years, with concerts and fireworks, and ICONSIAM stages a show over the Chao Phraya River. Songkran is known for public water fights, which symbolize ritual cleansing and the washing away of bad luck.

Regions

Europe

Scotland 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿 — Hogmanay

Hogmanay, the Scots name for New Year's Eve, was long Scotland's main winter celebration: Christmas Day only became a public holiday there in 1958. The festivities continue on New Year's Day and, in some cases, January 2, a bank holiday in Scotland. Key traditions include first-footing (the first person to cross the threshold after midnight brings gifts such as coal, shortbread and whisky for good luck), the singing of “Auld Lang Syne” (adapted by the Scottish poet Robert Burns in 1788 from an older folk song) and, in Edinburgh, a multi-day festival with a torchlight procession and a street party.

Spain 🇪🇸 — Las Doce Uvas

Spain's tradition is to eat twelve grapes as the clock strikes midnight, one per chime. Called las doce uvas de la suerte (the twelve lucky grapes), each grape stands for one month of the coming year, and those who manage all twelve in time are said to have good luck for the year. Crowds gather at the Puerta del Sol in Madrid, where the clock's chimes are televised, and many families watch at home.

Netherlands 🇳🇱 — Oliebollen

The Dutch eat oliebollen (deep-fried dough balls dusted with powdered sugar), a street-stall snack that appears throughout December and is traditional on New Year's Eve. Private fireworks were long part of the night too, but the Safe New Year's Eve Act (Wet veilige jaarwisseling), in force since 1 August 2026, ends the purchase, use and possession of consumer fireworks in the Netherlands. Only small F1 fireworks such as sparklers are still allowed, and professional shows can go ahead.

Germany 🇩🇪 — Silvester

Germans call New Year's Eve Silvester, after Saint Sylvester, whose feast day falls on December 31. In Berlin the Brandenburg Gate is the traditional gathering place, with a free-ticket open-air party and, traditionally, fireworks at midnight. Private fireworks are widely used across the country, sometimes controversially, and Berlin's police designate firework-free zones. Other customs include Bleigießen (telling fortunes from the shapes that molten metal or wax makes in cold water; lead sets have been banned from sale in Germany since 2018) and jam-filled doughnuts.

Russia 🇷🇺 — Novy God

New Year (Novy God) is Russia's main winter holiday. In the Soviet era, when Christmas celebrations were discouraged, the decorated tree and the gift-giving moved to New Year, and Ded Moroz (Grandfather Frost, with his granddaughter Snegurochka, the Snow Maiden) brings gifts to children. Families watch the president's televised address just before midnight, followed by the chimes of the Kremlin clock. Red Square has been closed to visitors on New Year's Eve in recent years, and Moscow has held no official New Year fireworks since 2022.

Denmark 🇩🇰

Danes traditionally jump off chairs at midnight, a literal leap into the new year, and some throw old plates at the doors of friends' houses: a pile of broken crockery on your step means you have many friends.

Regions

Americas

United States 🇺🇸 — Times Square Ball Drop

The Times Square Ball Drop in New York City is the best-known American New Year's Eve tradition. The ball first descended in 1907, and the Times Square Alliance, which co-organizes the Ball Drop with Countdown Entertainment, estimates a worldwide audience of over one billion people each year. Americans also celebrate with champagne toasts at midnight, parties, and the singing of “Auld Lang Syne.”

Brazil 🇧🇷 — Réveillon Branco

Brazilians traditionally wear white on New Year's Eve as a symbol of peace and purification, a custom with roots in the Afro-Brazilian religions Candomblé and Umbanda. Many people throw flowers into the sea as offerings to Iemanjá, the Queen of the Sea, or jump seven waves, making a wish with each jump. Rio de Janeiro's free party on Copacabana beach is billed by Rio's City Hall as the world's largest, with city estimates running to millions of people, and São Paulo's Réveillon na Paulista draws crowds the city puts at around two million.

Colombia 🇨🇴 — Año Viejo

Colombians burn effigies called Año Viejo (Old Year) around midnight. These life-size dolls, made of old clothes stuffed with paper and sometimes fireworks, stand for the year that is ending and its troubles; burning them is a way of leaving the bad behind and welcoming the new.

Chile 🇨🇱

Chileans traditionally eat lentils on New Year's Eve for good luck, along with twelve grapes, one for each month of the coming year.

Regions

Middle East & Africa

Iran 🇮🇷 — Nowruz

Iran celebrates Nowruz (Persian New Year) at the spring equinox, on March 20 or 21, not on January 1. The festival, whose roots lie in Zoroastrianism, lasts thirteen days in Iran. Families set the Haft-Seen table (seven symbolic items whose names begin with the letter sin, the Persian S), visit one another and begin with a major spring cleaning of the home. The United Nations says more than 300 million people worldwide celebrate Nowruz, in regions that include Central Asia, the Caucasus and the Middle East. For a live countdown to the exact moment of the equinox, visit nowruz.onl.

South Africa 🇿🇦 — Cape Minstrel Carnival

Cape Town has a distinctive New Year tradition: the Cape Minstrel Carnival (Kaapse Klopse) on January 2, also called Tweede Nuwe Jaar (Second New Year). Troupes of thousands of performers in colorful costumes parade through the streets with music and dance. Its roots lie in the day off that enslaved people at the Cape were given on January 2; the minstrel style was later influenced by visiting American minstrel troupes.

Nigeria 🇳🇬

In Lagos, church crossover services, where congregations worship through midnight into the new year, are a major part of New Year's Eve for many people. The night also brings concerts, ticketed beach and rooftop parties and family gatherings, with Afrobeats at the center of the music.

Cities

Count down in these countries

Midnight arrives at a different moment in every country. Pick a city to count down to its New Year, or see where it is New Year right now.