Groundhog Day

Groundhog Day is February 2 every year, so Groundhog Day 2027 falls on Tuesday, February 2. It is a folk observance rather than a federal holiday: schools, banks and offices stay open. The custom grew out of Candlemas weather lore that German immigrants carried to Pennsylvania, and its best-known version has played out at Gobbler’s Knob in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, since 1887.

What Groundhog Day Is

The whole forecast fits in one sentence. If a groundhog comes out of its burrow on February 2 and sees its shadow, winter will last six more weeks; if the sky is cloudy and there is no shadow, spring will arrive early. The odd logic is the charm of it: a bright, sunny morning, the kind most people want in February, is the bad omen.

The forecaster is a groundhog, also called a woodchuck, a large rodent in the squirrel family. It is one of the few North American mammals that truly hibernates, usually from about October to March or April, so a groundhog that is up and about on February 2 is early by its own standards. Punxsutawney Phil, the most famous of them, is described by NOAA as a 20-pound groundhog.

Groundhog Day History: From Candlemas to Gobbler’s Knob

Candlemas weather lore in Europe

February 2 was already a marked day long before anyone asked a groundhog about it. It is Candlemas, a Christian feast on which churches blessed candles for the rest of winter, and over the centuries it gathered weather sayings. The common thread was that a fair, bright Candlemas meant the cold was not finished.

In German-speaking regions, the forecast was tied to an animal leaving its den. Accounts name a badger in some places and a hedgehog in others. The National Weather Service office in Pittsburgh also points to French and German stories of marmots and bears that were startled by their shadows and went back to sleep for four to six weeks, and to a Scottish verse linking Candlemas weather to the length of winter.

The first American record, 1841

German-speaking settlers brought the belief to Pennsylvania, where hedgehogs do not live but groundhogs are common. The earliest known American reference is a diary entry dated February 4, 1841, by James Morris, a storekeeper in Morgantown, Berks County. He noted that the previous Tuesday, the 2nd, had been Candlemas, and that according to the Germans a groundhog that saw its shadow went back into its burrow for six weeks, while a cloudy day meant moderate weather. The diary is held by the Historical Society of Berks County in Reading.

Punxsutawney, 1886 and 1887

The custom turned into a public event in Punxsutawney, a small borough in Jefferson County in western Pennsylvania. The local paper, the Punxsutawney Spirit, wrote about Groundhog Day in 1886. On February 2, 1887, a group of local men who called themselves the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club made the first official trek to Gobbler’s Knob, and the groundhog saw his shadow. Clymer Freas, the Spirit’s city editor, is usually credited with promoting the idea. Some histories date the club’s formal founding to 1899, so the 1887 date is best read as the first organized forecast.

The ceremony has been held nearly every year since. It was canceled in 1943 during World War II, and in 2021, during the COVID-19 pandemic, it took place without the usual crowd for the first time.

When Is Groundhog Day? How the February 2 Date Works

The rule could not be simpler: Groundhog Day is February 2 in every year. Because the date is fixed, the weekday moves forward by one each year, or by two after a leap day. February 2 was a Sunday in 2025 and a Monday in 2026, and it will be a Tuesday in 2027, as the 2027 calendar shows.

There is no observed day. Groundhog Day is not a federal or state holiday, so nothing shifts when it lands on a weekend. In 2025 the Inner Circle arrived at Gobbler’s Knob around 7 a.m. on a Sunday, exactly as it would have on a workday.

The date also has an astronomical logic. February 2 sits roughly halfway between the December solstice and the March equinox. Count six weeks, or 42 days, forward from February 2 and you reach March 16 in a common year and March 15 in a leap year. The March equinox usually arrives around March 20, so “six more weeks of winter” actually ends a few days before astronomical spring. The Pittsburgh weather office notes that about 1,000 years ago, before the Gregorian calendar reform, the equinox fell on March 16, exactly six weeks after February 2. For more on why that date drifted, see the guide to the history of the Gregorian calendar and the explainer on equinoxes and solstices.

How Punxsutawney Celebrates Groundhog Day

The Punxsutawney event is part civic ritual, part theater. Members of the Groundhog Club’s Inner Circle wear top hats and tuxedos and run the ceremony at Gobbler’s Knob in front of a crowd that numbers in the thousands. Phil is brought out onto a stump, and the club’s president, holding a cane that he says lets him understand “Groundhogese,” confers with the groundhog. A scroll announcing the verdict is then unrolled and read aloud, and the crowd cheers or boos.

The club keeps its legend going with a straight face. The Inner Circle says one Phil has made every forecast since 1887, kept alive by an “elixir of life” he drinks each summer, and that he has never been wrong. Wild groundhogs usually live two or three years, so the immortality claim is part of the joke. Phil saw his shadow in both 2025 and 2026, calling for six more weeks of winter each time.

Attendance grew sharply after the 1993 film. For a borough that the 2020 census counted at 5,769 residents, the February 2 crowd can be several times the local population.

Other Groundhogs and Regional Traditions

Punxsutawney has plenty of competition. A NOAA review of forecasters with at least 20 years of predictions included 19 contestants, among them:

• Staten Island Chuck of the Staten Island Zoo in New York, who topped NOAA’s ranking at 85 percent for 2006 to 2025.
• General Beauregard Lee in Georgia, who ranked near the top.
• Lander Lil, a prairie dog statue in Wyoming, and Mojave Max, a desert tortoise in Nevada, which finished last.
• Woodstock Willie, who forecasts in Woodstock, Illinois, where the movie was filmed.

Canada has its own lineup, including Wiarton Willie in Ontario and Shubenacadie Sam in Nova Scotia, whose forecast is the first in North America each February 2.

In southeastern Pennsylvania the older German roots show most clearly. Groundhog lodges there, known as Grundsow Lodges, hold winter gatherings conducted in the Pennsylvania German dialect, and members who slip into English pay a fine for each English word.

How Accurate Is Punxsutawney Phil?

Federal scientists have checked. NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information compares Phil’s forecast with US national temperatures for February and March. Its analysis, updated in January 2026, found Phil right about 30 percent of the time over the past 10 years. His 2025 call for more winter missed: February was near average nationally and March was much warmer than usual.

A separate NOAA ranking for 2006 to 2025 put Phil at 35 percent, tied for 17th of 19 forecasters. Over the long run, Phil has seen his shadow far more often than not, more than 100 times against roughly 20 early springs, with about a decade of early years left unrecorded.

The deeper problem is scale. One groundhog in western Pennsylvania issues a single forecast for a country that, in any given February, can be mild in the Southwest and frigid in the Northeast. Even a perfect local prediction would often be wrong for the nation.

The 1993 Movie That Made “Groundhog Day” a Phrase

Most Americans who have never been to Punxsutawney know the town from the film. Groundhog Day, directed by Harold Ramis and written by Danny Rubin and Ramis, opened on February 12, 1993. Bill Murray plays a TV weatherman sent to cover the forecast who wakes up on February 2 again and again. February 12, 1993, was a Friday, which you can confirm with the day of the week calculator.

The movie is set in Punxsutawney but was shot in Woodstock, Illinois, starting March 16, 1992. Ramis said the real town lacked the kind of center the story needed, and the end credits thank the Punxsutawney Groundhog Club. The Library of Congress added the film to the National Film Registry in 2006, and its title has become everyday shorthand for any situation that keeps repeating.

Twelve days after Groundhog Day comes Valentine’s Day, and the third Monday of February brings Presidents’ Day, which makes early February one of the busier stretches of the winter calendar.