Losar 2084: Dates, Customs & How Sherpa, Tamang & Gurung Celebrate

Losar 2084 Dates at a Glance

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When Is Losar 2084?

Before anything else, it helps to be clear about what is actually being asked. "Losar" is a general word for New Year used across several Himalayan and Tibetan Buddhist cultural traditions, and in Nepal it refers to three separate festivals celebrated by three separate communities, on three separate dates. Someone searching for "Losar 2084" could mean any one of the three, so here is each one on its own.

Tamu Losar 2084

Tamu Losar 2084 falls on Thursday, December 30, 2027 (Poush 15, 2084 BS). This is celebrated by the Gurung, or Tamu, community. Because Tamu Losar is pegged to a fixed day of the Nepali solar calendar rather than to a moon phase, it has landed on December 30 every year since at least 2022 and is one of the easiest Losar dates to state with confidence this far in advance.

Sonam Losar 2084

Sonam Losar, the Tamang community's New Year, falls on Magh Shukla Pratipada: the first day of the bright lunar fortnight of the Nepali month of Magh. Based on that rule and on the Gregorian equivalent of Magh 2084 BS, Sonam Losar 2084 is expected to fall around late January 2028. Because this depends on a lunar calculation rather than a fixed solar date, the precise day is confirmed closer to the year by Nepal's panchang, not published years ahead. We will update this page the moment an authoritative date is available.

Gyalpo Losar 2084

Gyalpo Losar, observed by Sherpa communities and other Tibetan Buddhist groups, falls on Falgun Shukla Pratipada: the first day of the bright lunar fortnight of Falgun. Projections based on the Tibetan lunar calendar put Gyalpo Losar 2084 at around late February 2028. As with Sonam Losar, this is a projection, not a confirmed date. Tibetan calendar dates are calculated by astrological institutions closer to the year in question, and in some years different Tibetan Buddhist traditions have observed Losar up to a lunar month apart, so we will confirm and update this section once that calculation is published.

What Is Losar?

Losar is a New Year festival associated with several Himalayan and Tibetan Buddhist cultural traditions. It is not a single festival with one date and one set of customs; it is a shared concept, the turning of the year, expressed differently by different communities who each observe their own Losar on their own calendar. In Nepal, the three most prominent are Tamu Losar (Gurung), Sonam Losar (Tamang) and Gyalpo Losar (Sherpa and other Tibetan Buddhist communities). Related communities in Sikkim, Darjeeling and the wider Himalayan belt observe closely related traditions.

Reducing Losar to "Nepal's Tibetan New Year" misses most of what the festival actually is in Nepal. Only Gyalpo Losar is tied to the Tibetan calendar in the way that phrase implies. Tamu Losar and Sonam Losar are the New Year festivals of the Gurung and Tamang communities respectively, each with its own history, calendar logic and customs, celebrated by millions of people who are not Tibetan and do not describe their New Year that way.

What the three do share is a general shape: an ending of the old year and a beginning of the new one, marked by cleaning and preparing the home, family gatherings, traditional food, music and dance, and blessings exchanged between generations. The details of how that shape is filled in, what is cooked, what is worn, what is danced, differ by community and even by family.

What Does "Losar" Mean?

The word Losar comes from Tibetan: lo means year, and sar means new. Put together, Losar translates to "New Year." In Tamu kyi, the Gurung language, the same festival name is explained slightly differently, commonly rendered as combining ideas of "new" and "change," reflecting the same underlying idea of moving from one year into the next. Each tradition also names its years using a twelve-year animal cycle, similar in spirit to other Asian lunar calendars, though the exact set of animal names and their order vary by community.

Tamu Losar: How Gurung Communities Celebrate

Who celebrates Tamu Losar?

Tamu Losar is the New Year of the Gurung community, who refer to themselves as Tamu. It is most widely celebrated in Gurung-majority areas of Kaski, Lamjung, Manang, Gorkha and Tanahun, in the city of Pokhara, and by Gurung communities living in Kathmandu and abroad, including in the UK, where a significant Gurung diaspora exists partly through the legacy of Gurkha military service.

When is Tamu Losar 2084?

Tamu Losar 2084 falls on Thursday, December 30, 2027 (Poush 15, 2084 BS).

What does Tamu Losar mean, and how old is the celebration?

Tamu Losar marks the new year on the Gurung community's own twelve-year animal calendar cycle, known as Lohokor. Nepal's government first recognized Poush 15 as a public holiday for Tamu Losar in the 1990s, following organized advocacy by Gurung cultural organizations, and it has been observed as an official holiday in Nepal since.

How do Gurung communities celebrate?

Traditions vary by family, locality and community, but common elements of Tamu Losar include:

• Prayer flags and community gatherings. Homes and public spaces are decorated, and prayer flags are put up in places with Buddhist influence in the community, including at Kathmandu's Swayambhunath and Boudhanath stupas during the season.
• Traditional dress. Men commonly wear a bhangra, a wraparound apron, with a kachhad, a wraparound lower garment. Women commonly wear a ghalek paired with a velvet gunyo-cholo blouse and gold jewelry, including earrings and necklaces set with semi-precious stones.
• Music and dance. The Ghatu dance, a devotional dance-drama tradition, and Chudka are associated with Gurung cultural performance, along with folk songs such as Thado Bhaka.
• Community and family gatherings. As with most Losar traditions, family reunions, shared meals, and community cultural programs are central to the day.

Kathmandu's Gurung community typically holds a large public procession and cultural program around Tamu Losar, drawing participants from across the Kathmandu Valley, while celebrations in Pokhara and the western hill districts tend to be more rooted in individual village and family observance.

Sonam Losar: How Tamang Communities Celebrate

Who celebrates Sonam Losar?

Sonam Losar is the New Year of the Tamang community, and is also observed, under related names, by some Hyolmo communities. It is celebrated widely across Tamang settlement areas of the Kathmandu Valley and the surrounding hill districts, including Rasuwa, Sindhupalchok, Nuwakot and Dhading, as well as by Tamang and Hyolmo communities in Sikkim and Darjeeling in India.

When is Sonam Losar 2084?

Sonam Losar 2084 is expected around late January 2028, based on the rule that it falls on Magh Shukla Pratipada in the BS 2084 calendar. As explained above, the exact day has not yet been confirmed by Nepal's official panchang.

How is Sonam Losar celebrated?

Sonam Losar traditionally marked the end of the agricultural cycle, celebrated once crops were harvested and stored. Customs vary between Tamang communities in different locations, but commonly include:

• Cleaning the home and visiting monasteries. Homes are cleaned to welcome the new year, and many families visit local monasteries and stupas for prayers.
• Music and dance. Tamang Selo, a distinctive song and dance style accompanied by the damphu, a hand-held frame drum, is closely associated with Tamang cultural identity and is performed widely during Sonam Losar. Among Hyolmo and Rasuwali Tamang communities, the Syabru dance is also a well-known feature of the celebration.
• Food. Dishes associated with the day include khapse (fried pastries also common to other Losar traditions) and, among Hyolmo communities specifically, babar, a rice-based bread, and thongsey.
• Family and community gatherings. As with Tamu and Gyalpo Losar, the day centres on family reunion, shared food, and community cultural programs; Kathmandu hosts some of the largest public Sonam Losar gatherings, but the day is celebrated just as significantly in Tamang village communities across the hills.

Because Tamang communities span a wide geographic area with real local variation, a single Kathmandu cultural program is not representative of how every Tamang household marks the day. Village-level celebrations, centred on family and the local monastery, remain the more common experience for most Tamang families.

Gyalpo Losar: How Sherpa Communities Celebrate

Who celebrates Gyalpo Losar?

Gyalpo Losar is observed by Sherpa communities and other Tibetan Buddhist communities of Nepal, including groups in Solukhumbu, Mustang and Dolpo, Tibetan Buddhist communities in parts of Kathmandu, and Tibetan refugee communities living in Nepal. It follows the Tibetan lunar calendar rather than a Nepal-specific community calendar.

When is Gyalpo Losar 2084?

Gyalpo Losar 2084 is expected around late February 2028, based on the rule that it falls on Falgun Shukla Pratipada. This is a projection rather than a confirmed date; Tibetan Buddhist astrological calendars finalize the exact day closer to the year, and in some years different Tibetan traditions have observed Losar on dates roughly a lunar month apart, which we address further below.

How is Gyalpo Losar celebrated?

Gyalpo Losar traditions draw on Tibetan Buddhist religious practice as well as family and community custom, and celebrations commonly extend across several days:

• Losar eve: guthuk. On the evening before Losar, many families share guthuk, a noodle soup, as part of a ritual meal that is followed in some households by playful fortune-telling traditions.
• Home preparation. Homes are thoroughly cleaned in the days before Losar, and decorated with auspicious symbols. Cedar and juniper branches are prepared for incense offerings.
• Monastery visits and prayer. Many families begin the new year by visiting a monastery or stupa, most visibly at Boudhanath and Swayambhunath in Kathmandu, or at monasteries in Solukhumbu and the Everest region, for prayers and blessings.
• Food. Khapse (fried pastries), chang (a fermented barley drink) and dishes built around phyemar, a decorated container of roasted barley flour and other grains symbolizing a good harvest, are traditionally associated with the celebration.
• Family and community gatherings. As with the other Losar traditions, the days around Gyalpo Losar are centred on family visits, shared meals, and community cultural events.

For many families, Gyalpo Losar carries both a religious dimension, centred on monastery visits and prayer, and a cultural one, centred on family and community. The balance between the two varies by household: some observe it primarily as a religious occasion, others emphasize the cultural and family gathering, and many combine both without treating them as separate.

How Many People Celebrate Each Losar?

Exact headcounts of who actively observes each Losar do not exist. The closest official proxy is Nepal's national census, which counts how many people report each caste or ethnicity, the community each Losar tradition belongs to. These figures are a scale reference, not a literal count of celebrants: not everyone in a community practices every tradition actively, and the numbers below cover Nepal only, excluding diaspora communities abroad.

Tamu vs Sonam vs Gyalpo Losar

Because these three festivals are so often lumped together, a direct side-by-side comparison is one of the most useful things this guide can offer.

Common Misconceptions About Losar

"All Losar celebrations are the same." They are not. Tamu, Sonam and Gyalpo Losar belong to different communities, follow different calendar rules, and fall on different dates. Treating them as interchangeable erases the distinct identity each one represents.

"Every Nepali Himalayan community celebrates the same Losar." Gurung, Tamang, Sherpa and other Himalayan communities in Nepal are culturally and linguistically distinct groups, each with its own New Year tradition. A Gurung family's Tamu Losar and a Sherpa family's Gyalpo Losar are different festivals held months apart, not regional variants of one event.

"Losar always falls on the same date every year." Only Tamu Losar is pegged to a fixed day. Sonam Losar and Gyalpo Losar follow lunar calendar rules, so both the AD date and, in Sonam and Gyalpo Losar's case, the BS date itself can shift from year to year.

"Losar is only a religious festival." For many families, Losar is as much about family reunion, food and cultural identity as it is about religious practice. The balance between religious observance and cultural celebration varies by community, by family, and by individual.

"Losar is only celebrated in the mountains." While these traditions originate in specific hill and mountain communities, all three Losar festivals are celebrated with major public gatherings in Kathmandu and other cities, and by diaspora communities abroad, including in the UK, Hong Kong, the Gulf, and North America.

How Nepali Families Celebrate Losar

Across all three traditions, a similar rhythm shapes the days around Losar, even though the specific customs differ. In the days before, homes are cleaned thoroughly, food is prepared, and clothing is readied for guests. On the day itself, many families begin with prayers or a visit to a monastery or stupa where that is part of their tradition, followed by dressing in traditional clothing and gathering as a family. Through the rest of the day, relatives visit one another, blessings are exchanged between generations, and food is shared. In the evening and over the following days, community programs bring music, dance and public celebration into the streets and public grounds, particularly in Kathmandu, Pokhara and other cities with large populations from these communities.

Exactly how each of these elements plays out differs by family, locality and generation, and no single description captures every household's experience.

Is Losar a Public Holiday in Nepal?

This is more nuanced than a yes or no answer. In Nepal's standing holiday framework, Tamu Losar, Sonam Losar and Gyalpo Losar are classified as restricted or community-specific holidays rather than nationwide closures like Dashain or Tihar, meaning the default expectation is that the holiday applies to offices in areas with a significant population of the relevant community, and to leave entitlements for staff from that community, rather than a blanket closure of every government office in the country.

In practice, the picture has sometimes been more generous than that default. In at least one recent year, the Government of Nepal's Council of Ministers issued a specific decision extending a public holiday for Sonam Lhosar to all government offices and public institutions nationwide, with at least one province separately extending the holiday across all of its districts. This shows that the government has, at times, treated these holidays as effectively nationwide through a specific decision made close to the date, rather than only through the standing restricted classification.

For 2084, the honest answer is that final holiday status for Tamu Losar, Sonam Losar and Gyalpo Losar will depend on the notice issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs and the Council of Ministers closer to each date. This page will be updated once that notice is available for the relevant year.

Why Does the Losar Date Change Every Year?

Tamu Losar is fixed to Poush 15 of the Nepali solar calendar, so it lands on almost the same Gregorian date each year, with only the day of the week changing. Sonam Losar and Gyalpo Losar are different: both are defined by a specific day in a lunar calendar (Magh Shukla Pratipada and Falgun Shukla Pratipada respectively), and a lunar year runs shorter than the 365-day Gregorian year. That gap means the Gregorian date drifts most years, and when a leap month is inserted into the lunar calendar to keep it aligned with the seasons, the date can jump by close to a full month. This is also why, in some years, different Tibetan Buddhist traditions calculating the lunar calendar independently have observed Gyalpo Losar on dates roughly a month apart. It is not an error on anyone's part; it reflects genuine differences in how the leap month is calculated between traditions.

Is Losar the Same as Tibetan New Year?

Gyalpo Losar is what people usually mean by "Tibetan New Year," and it does follow the Tibetan lunar calendar. But Losar as a broader term is not exclusively Tibetan. Tamu Losar and Sonam Losar are the New Year festivals of the Gurung and Tamang communities, with their own histories and calendar logic, and are not simply Nepali versions of the Tibetan festival. All three share the general concept, and some historical and cultural connections, but collapsing them into "Tibetan New Year" erases two distinct Nepali community traditions.

Losar vs Dashain and Tihar

Comparing Losar to Nepal's two largest festivals helps place it in context, without suggesting they are equivalent.

For readers who want the full picture of Nepal's biggest festivals, see our Dashain 2083 guide and Tihar 2083 guide.

Losar and the Nepali Calendar

Losar is only one of many important dates in Nepal's calendar year. If you are planning family gatherings, travel, school events, or community programs around Losar, it is worth checking what else falls nearby.

If you also need to convert a specific Nepali date to English, or an English date back into BS, the Nepali Date Converter handles that instantly and is useful for sharing Losar dates with family or colleagues who think in the Gregorian calendar.

Losar in Kathmandu and Other Parts of Nepal

Kathmandu Valley hosts the largest public celebrations for all three Losar traditions, partly because it is home to significant Gurung, Tamang and Sherpa/Tibetan Buddhist populations, and partly because it is where diaspora members of these communities return to for the festival. Boudhanath and Swayambhunath are the best-known public gathering points for Gyalpo Losar and, to an extent, Tamu Losar prayer flag traditions. Kathmandu also holds large public Sonam Losar cultural programs.

Outside the valley, celebrations are, if anything, more deeply rooted. Pokhara, Lamjung, Kaski and Manang carry the heart of Tamu Losar. Rasuwa, Sindhupalchok, Nuwakot and Dhading are centres of Tamang life and Sonam Losar. Solukhumbu, the Everest region, and Mustang are strongly associated with Sherpa and Tibetan Buddhist communities and Gyalpo Losar. These are not exclusive boundaries; each of these communities has members and celebrations well beyond these areas, including across the Tarai and in cities throughout Nepal.

Losar Food and Traditions

Food traditions vary between communities and between families, so treat the dishes below as commonly associated with each tradition rather than universal rules.

Traditional Clothing, Music and Dance

Each community's Losar clothing and performance traditions are distinct rather than interchangeable. Gurung Tamu Losar dress commonly includes the bhangra and kachhad for men, and the ghalek and gunyo-cholo for women, alongside gold jewelry; performance traditions include the Ghatu dance and Thado Bhaka songs. Tamang Sonam Losar is closely associated with Tamang Selo music played on the damphu, and, among Hyolmo and Rasuwali Tamang communities, the Syabru dance. Gyalpo Losar celebrations feature monastic music and cultural performances tied to Tibetan Buddhist tradition, alongside modern community cultural programs that have grown in Kathmandu and other cities in recent decades, with increasing youth participation in organizing and performing.

Visiting Nepal During Losar?

Travelers in Nepal during any of the three Losar periods may see prayer flags, home and street decorations, cultural processions, and monastery ceremonies, particularly around Boudhanath and Swayambhunath, or in Solukhumbu and Pokhara depending on which Losar falls during the visit. A few points of etiquette matter here as much as anywhere else in Nepal:

• Ask before photographing people, especially at family gatherings or religious ceremonies
• Follow instructions and dress modestly at monasteries and other religious spaces
• Do not touch religious objects, prayer wheels, or offerings without clear permission
• If invited into a home or community celebration, follow your hosts' lead rather than treating the occasion as a spectacle to observe from a distance

Planning a Losar Celebration?

• Confirm the correct Losar date for the tradition you are celebrating
• Check whether it has been declared a public holiday for the year
• Check community event schedules in your area
• Prepare traditional food for the gathering
• Prepare traditional clothing if that is part of your family's practice
• Contact family and relatives to plan the gathering
• Check the Nepali calendar for holidays and events around the same period

Losar 2084 Fact Sheet

Frequently Asked Questions