Christmas in Europe maps Europe's Christmas markets for people planning a trip there.

Who writes it

Adam Bognar edits Christmas in Europe, which The Still Brands Inc. publishes. Write to Adam through adambognar.com. Christmas in Europe shares its research methods with ridehokkaido.com and rideokinawa.com.

How we build it

The guide covers 100 towns and neighbourhoods, 154 places to stay, 16 culture and history, 21 dishes and drinks, 83 ways to get around, 95 events and seasons, 21 weather stations, 182 Christmas markets, 30 Christmas lights and light festivals, 17 countries, 58 churches and concert venues and 11 year-round Christmas shops and workshops.

Every page lists its sources and the month we last checked them. We say when a figure belongs to an operator and when it is ours, and we leave a field blank when we can't confirm it.

Every market on Christmas in Europe carries this season's dates with a word beside them. Confirmed means we read the dates in the organizer's own notice, and the page links it. Announced means a tourism board or another reliable page published them first. Projected means nobody has published yet, so our Season engine worked the dates out from the rule the market follows every year, such as the Friday before the first Sunday of Advent. We never print a projected date as fact, and the planner never sends anyone to a square on a day its own hours say it's shut.

A script re-reads every organizer's page each week from August to December, and a changed date reaches the page with its new source and the day we checked it. Opening hours carry their exceptions, so Christmas Eve's early closing and the Totensonntag closures in Germany show on the right days. The holiday laws behind those closures come from each state's own statute.

Train times come from the operators. Until our own timetable build covers a route, a town page prints the operator's published fastest time with a link to its planner and says that's what it is. Sunsets are computed for each city and date. Climate figures are the national weather services' 1991–2020 normals. Christmas is a living religious feast for many readers, so service pages give times, dress and photography rules and treat a Mass as worship first.

Where the photos come from

The 866 photos on the site come from photographers who publish under open licences on Wikimedia Commons, Flickr and Openverse. Each one is credited by name with its licence beside it, and the full list is on the credits page.

How the site makes money

Some booking links pay us a commission when you book a stay, a tour or a rental through them. They sit under a “Paid links” label and cost you nothing extra. The same places appear whether a partner pays us or not, and no business can pay to change what we write. How the links work.

How we fix mistakes

Timetables, prices and opening hours change with the season. If something here is out of date, tell us through adambognar.com and we'll fix it and date the change.