Fact check: Where in Europe has the longest school summer holidays?

French President Emmanuel Macron caused a stir last week by saying he wanted to reopen the debate on the length of school holidays.

The president suggested that by rethinking holidays, particularly summer holidays, the pressure could be taken off schools to help students learn better.

“France has longer holidays than many countries”, Macron said in response to a question by a child during a trip to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Colmar in France’s Haut-Rhin department. “The question we can ask ourselves for our children is: don’t we need to have another look at holidays a little so that we can relax the weeks and learn better?”

“There are many countries that only go on holiday only after 14 July,” he added. “We have very, very long holidays in the summer. Children who don’t have much support from their families often lose out in terms of their schooling. It’s something we’re going to open up, but it needs to be discussed a bit.”

But does France really have longer summer holidays than many other countries? How does it measure up with the rest of Europe?

As of the 2024-25 school year, French students have eight weeks off for the summer, beginning on 7 July, according to Eurydice, the European Commission-funded education information network.

But the data shows that at least 32 other European countries, or sometimes regions within countries, have longer summer school holidays than France this year.

Some countries’ numbers can differ depending on the region, grade or individual school, so EuroVerify has focused on the maximum number of weeks that a particular group of pupils get in a given country for this comparison.

Belgium’s Flemish and German-speaking communities, for example, get 8.9 weeks off, compared to seven for the French-speaking community.

To give another example, in Ireland, primary school pupils have nine weeks in summer, while those in secondary education get 13.

In Europe, those with the most time off are Bulgarian primary school students, who get between 13 and 15 weeks off; Italian students, who get between 11 and 14 weeks; and upper secondary Icelandic students, who get more than 13 weeks, according to Eurydice’s data for this school year.

At the bottom end of the table are Germany with just over six weeks, the Netherlands and Liechtenstein with six, and Denmark with just over five.

When looking at school holidays in general, and not just the summer break, France does rank highly compared to its European peers, sitting behind Malta and the Baltic countries.

What’s the state of education in Europe?

Macron suggested that reducing the amount of summer holidays that pupils get could improve the state of education in France.

The OECD’s most recent Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA), which evaluates educational systems by measuring 15-year-old school pupils’ performance in mathematics, science and reading, puts France’s education system squarely in the middle among European countries.

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The length of summer holidays in France also falls around the European average.

The best-performing education systems in Europe meanwhile are Estonia, Switzerland and the Netherlands, according to the PISA, which is carried out every three years.

While Estonia is at the top end when it comes to the length of school summer holidays, the Netherlands is towards the bottom.

The Swiss summer break can range between five and more than 10 weeks, depending on the region. Those with only five weeks have among the shortest summer holidays in Europe, while those with 10.9 rank among some of the longest.

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The lowest-ranking European education systems, according to the OECD, are Albania, North Macedonia and Montenegro.

They have some of the longest school summer holidays in Europe: Albania and Montenegro sit at 11 weeks and North Macedonia has 11.7.

Denmark, which has one of the shortest summer holidays, comes within the top 10 European education systems, according to the PISA, while Germany comes in just slightly higher than France, despite its shorter summer break.

Teachers in France have accused Macron of reopening the debate on summer holidays to distract from the real issues facing schools, according to national reports, such as a lack of teachers, stagnant pay and poor working conditions.

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Some have even claimed that, when talking about reevaluating school holidays, successive governments have tended to side with the tourism lobby rather than the interests of teachers and pupils.