What closes on which day in Morocco: the calendar nobody gives you (2026)

There is a category of bad surprise nobody plans for when preparing a trip to Morocco: the closed door. Not closed «for works» — closed because of the day. Agadir''s great souk on a Monday, a bank on a Saturday morning, a government office on Friday afternoon, an entire country changing rhythm during Ramadan. That calendar is nowhere written down in full. Here it is. Short answer The Moroccan working week runs Monday to Friday: banks and government offices are closed Saturday and Sunday. Around midday on Friday, many shops close for an hour or two for prayer. Medinas and city souks open every day, with a few exceptions — chief among them Agadir''s Souk El Had, closed on Mondays. Trains and coaches run seven days a week, public holidays included. Friday: the day that changes everything This is the most misread day for visitors, because it is not a closing day — it is a pause. Friday prayer falls around the middle of the day, generally between 12:30 and 14:30 depending on the season. Around that hour a good share of small businesses close, medinas included. Government offices slow right down in the afternoon; do not schedule paperwork for 2pm on a Friday. It is couscous day. Many family restaurants serve nothing else — good news, as long as you know it. The Hassan II Mosque in Casablanca — one of the few open to non-Muslim visits — suspends its guided tours during Friday prayer. The move: put lunch and a slow hour between 12:30 and 14:30 on a Friday, rather than a visit or an errand. Saturday and Sunday: what actually closes Banks: closed Saturday and Sunday. They run Monday to Friday and shut mid-afternoon, often around 3:45pm. Private exchange offices and ATMs work through the weekend. Government offices, consulates, courts: closed Saturday and Sunday, and often already winding down on Friday afternoon. New towns — Guéliz in Marrakech, Agdal in Rabat, Maârif in Casablanca: many shops close on Sunday, cafés stay open. Medinas and city souks: open, Sunday included. It is often the liveliest day, because Moroccans are out. Monday: the Agadir trap Agadir''s Souk El Had, the largest market in the south, closes on Mondays. It is the first thing many visitors come to see, and Monday is a common arrival day for charter flights and cruise calls. If you are in Agadir on a Monday, swap it for the marina, the Agadir Oufella kasbah or the Polizzi medina. As for museums, several national institutions take one closing day a week, often Tuesday. Hours vary site by site: check the day before, not the morning of. Weekly souks: the day is in the name Outside the big cities, rural markets are held one day a week — and the language says which. In Moroccan Arabic the names of the days double as souk names: Souk El Had — Sunday Souk Tnine — Monday Souk Tlata — Tuesday Souk Larbaa — Wednesday Souk Khemis — Thursday Souk Jemaa — Friday Souk Sebt — Saturday That is why the map of Morocco is full of towns called Had Soualem, Tnine Chtouka, Khemis Zemamra or Souk Sebt Oulad Nemma: they grew around their market and carry its day in their name. Planning a country souk? The town''s name already tells you when to go — and for Agadir''s Souk El Had, that same name explains its day off. Ramadan: not a closure, a shift Government offices move to continuous hours, often around 9am-3pm. Many neighbourhood cafés and restaurants close during the day and reopen after sunset. Hotels and tourist venues keep serving. The city wakes at night: medinas are busier at 10pm than at 3pm. The hour before iftar is the worst time to travel: heavy traffic, no taxis, everyone heading home. The country puts the clocks back one hour for the month — worth checking against any flight or ferry ticket. The two Eids: the only days the country really stops Eid al-Fitr (end of Ramadan) and Eid al-Adha are the two moments when almost everything closes for one or two days: shops, markets, offices, many restaurants. The dates follow the lunar calendar and move each year. The practical consequence matters more than the closure itself: transport saturates in the days before. Full trains, full coaches, packed stations. Book a week ahead if your trip falls then. There are also fixed national holidays — 1 and 11 January, 1 May, 30 July (Throne Day), 14 August, 20 and 21 August, 6 and 18 November — when offices and banks close but shops carry on. What never closes ONCF trains and CTM or Supratours coaches run seven days a week, holidays included. On-duty pharmacies cover nights and weekends, with the rota posted on the door of closed chemists. The great squares — Jemaa el-Fna in Marrakech, the Grand Socco in Tangier — live every day of the year. And your luggage in all this This calendar bites hardest on the day you change city: arriving on a Sunday or a public holiday means arriving somewhere with very few counters open. Which is exactly when you are looking for somewhere to put a suitcase between check-out and an evening train. BoxSpot points are shops, so they follow the country''s rhythm — and their real hours are shown before payment. Current markers: Rabat — 8am-10pm, seven days a week, Sunday included. Tangier (Gran Teatro Cervantes) — 10am-11pm, seven days a week. Casablanca — 7am-10pm on weekdays, shorter on Sunday. Marrakech — one point open daily near Bab Aghmat, a second deep in the medina closed on Sunday. Agadir — closed on Sunday, and earlier on Saturday. Fes — 9am-6pm, seven days a week, two minutes from the Chouara tanneries. One Tangier point illustrates this whole article: it closes between 2 and 3pm on Fridays, for prayer. Check the hours before you build your day Every point shows its real day-by-day hours before payment. From 9 MAD an hour. See the points and their hours