Two rulings of the Federal Administrative Court show how narrow the exceptions to Sunday rest are. In 2014 the services union ver.di and two Protestant deaneries challenged a Hessian regulation that allowed Sunday work in certain businesses. The court struck down the exceptions for video stores, public libraries, lottery companies and call centers. Films and books, the court reasoned, can be borrowed on weekdays. In 2015 the court ruled on a shopping Sunday in Eching in Bavaria, held together with a spring market. The market, not the shops, must shape the public character of the day. The shop opening may only be an annex to it. Das bloß wirtschaftliche Umsatzinteresse, the mere commercial interest in sales, is not a reason. The local ordinance was invalid.
Advent Sundays in Berlin
Berlin’s shop-opening law once allowed stores to open on all four Sundays in Advent. The Protestant church of Berlin-Brandenburg-schlesische Oberlausitz and the Catholic Archdiocese of Berlin challenged it at the Federal Constitutional Court. On 1 December 2009, the court ruled that the Advent Sunday rule did not agree with the constitutional guarantee of rest on Sundays and public holidays. Rest is the rule, and opening is the exception. The sales interests of shop owners and the everyday shopping interests of customers are not enough to justify opening. The rule remained valid only until 31 December 2009.
Not on Good Friday
The FSK, the film industry’s voluntary self-regulation body, does more than set age ratings. It also decides whether a film may be shown in public on silent holidays such as Good Friday. The film must suit the serious character of the day. The rule dates from 1952. According to the Berliner Zeitung, the list of films without this release had 756 titles in 2016. Among them are Heidi, Das Leben des Brian (Life of Brian), Max und Moritz and Ghostbusters.
The list now grows only slowly. According to the FSK, more than half of all films lacked the holiday release from the 1950s to the 1970s, but 1 percent or less since 2000. The FSK has called the restriction kaum noch nachvollziehbar, hardly understandable anymore. It applies only to cinemas, not to television or streaming.
The Silent Days
In Bavaria, Good Friday is one of the stille Tage, the silent days, under the state holiday law. On Good Friday, sports events are banned, and so is music of any kind in places that serve drinks. In 2007 the freethinkers’ association Bund für Geistesfreiheit planned a Heidenspaß-Party, a heathens’ fun party, in a Munich theater on Good Friday. The city banned it. The case went to the Federal Constitutional Court. In a decision of 27 October 2016, published in November, the court found the protection of the silent days constitutional in principle. The protection, it said, creates lediglich einen äußeren Ruherahmen, only an outer frame of quiet. The law must, however, allow exceptions for events protected by freedom of belief or assembly.
Free Sundays by Law
Where Sunday work is allowed in Germany, the law still protects a minimum. Under Section 11 of the Working Hours Act, at least 15 Sundays a year must remain free of work. An employee who works on a Sunday must get a replacement day of rest within two weeks. For young workers the rule is stricter. The Youth Employment Protection Act says: An Sonntagen dürfen Jugendliche nicht beschäftigt werden. Young people may not be employed on Sundays. Where exceptions apply, at least two Sundays a month must stay free. The act also says: Am 24. und 31. Dezember nach 14 Uhr und an gesetzlichen Feiertagen dürfen Jugendliche nicht beschäftigt werden. On 24 and 31 December after 2 p.m. and on public holidays, young people may not be employed.
No Trucks on Sunday
On Sundays and public holidays, from midnight to 10 p.m., trucks over 7.5 tonnes may not be driven in Germany to carry goods commercially. The ban also covers empty runs, and trailers behind trucks. It is set in Section 30 of the Road Traffic Regulations. Some holidays count only in the states that observe them. Corpus Christi, for example, counts only in Baden-Württemberg, Bavaria, Hesse, North Rhine-Westphalia, Rhineland-Palatinate and Saarland.
No Lawn Mowing on Sunday
A federal noise regulation, the Geräte- und Maschinenlärmschutzverordnung, sets quiet times for machines used outdoors. In residential areas, the machines it lists may not be run at all on Sundays and public holidays, and not between 8 p.m. and 7 a.m. on weekdays. The list includes lawn mowers and leaf blowers. It also includes bottle banks, so the glass containers in residential areas may not be used on Sundays. Some of the loudest garden machines, such as leaf blowers, are also restricted on weekday mornings, at midday and in the early evening, unless they carry the EU eco-label. The midday rest, the Mittagsruhe, is not set in federal or state law. It is set, if at all, in leases, house rules or local bylaws.
Unpaid Overtime
According to the Institute for Employment Research, IAB, employees in Germany worked about 1.2 billion overtime hours in 2024. More than half of them, 53.6 percent, were unpaid. The same figure appears in a parliamentary question in the Bundestag in 2025. The IAB count leaves out overtime that is later balanced through working-time accounts. Unpaid here means that the hours were neither paid nor taken back as time off.
The Vocabulary of Counted Time
die Überstunden — overtime hours.
die Plusstunden and die Minusstunden — plus hours and minus hours on a working-time account.
Überstunden abfeiern — literally to celebrate away overtime, to take it back as time off.
abbummeln — the colloquial word for the same thing.
der Freizeitausgleich — compensation in free time.
die Stechuhr — the time clock.
ein- und ausstempeln — to clock in and out.
die Zeiterfassung — time recording.
das Gleitzeitkonto — the flexitime account.
The 45-Minute Lesson
A German school lesson, the Schulstunde, lasts 45 minutes, not an hour. Lessons once lasted 60 minutes. On 22 August 1911, the Prussian minister of culture, August von Trott zu Solz, ordered that a lesson at all higher schools be set at 45 minutes. The reason was practical. With shorter lessons, all 30 to 32 weekly lessons could be placed in the morning. According to the German Historical Museum, a pedagogical lexicon of 1917 suspected that the change was made for reasons of rationalization.