Germany takes Sundays off — shops, lawnmowers and bottle banks: a guide to Sonntagsruhe

Sunday morning, and the supermarket is shut

Plenty of newcomers have the same first-Sunday moment: you pop out for milk and find the supermarket, the clothes shop and the drugstore all closed. In Germany, Sunday is a day of rest (Ruhetag) — people call it Sonntagsruhe, "Sunday rest". It happens to be Sunday today, so here is how to get through a German Sunday with ease.

Why do the shops close?

Sunday rest is in the constitution. Article 140 of the Basic Law (Grundgesetz) takes over Article 139 of the Weimar Constitution, which protects Sundays and public holidays as "days of rest from work and of spiritual elevation". Since 2006, shop opening hours have mostly been set by each federal state. Weekday hours therefore differ from state to state, but on Sundays ordinary shops stay closed in almost every state. In 2009 the Federal Constitutional Court even ruled that Berlin had gone too far by letting shops open on all four Advent Sundays.

What is open anyway

• Bakeries — in many states they may open for a few hours on Sunday morning. Fresh Sunday Brötchen are one of Germany's small joys
• Petrol stations — they sell basic groceries and drinks, at a slightly higher price
• Shops in big stations and airports — many open on Sundays for travellers; large stations such as Berlin Hauptbahnhof even have a supermarket
• Berlin's Spätis — little corner shops. Sunday rules differ between states and are enforced differently, so some are open and some are not
• Restaurants, cafés, museums — mostly open on Sundays

Keep it quiet — the noise rules

Under a federal regulation, the Equipment and Machinery Noise Protection Ordinance (32. BImSchV), noisy machines such as lawnmowers may not be used in residential areas on Sundays and public holidays — all day. Leaf blowers (Laubbläser) have even shorter permitted hours on weekdays. Drilling, hammering and loud music are usually covered by your building's house rules (Hausordnung). And the neighbourhood bottle banks (Altglascontainer) often carry a sign asking you not to use them on Sundays — breaking glass is loud.

On a Sunday	Fine ✅	Better not ❌
At home	A quick hoover, cooking, guests	Drilling, hammering nails (check the house rules)
Garden	A walk, a barbecue (not too loud)	Lawnmower, leaf blower
Neighbourhood	Bakery, café, park	Throwing bottles in the bottle bank (check the sign)
Shopping	Station and airport shops, petrol stations	Ordinary supermarkets (closed)

Some Sundays the shops do open

There is the verkaufsoffener Sonntag, a "shopping Sunday", allowed only a few times a year, usually tied to a local festival or market. How many there may be and under what conditions depends on the state. Look out for banners in town or notices from the city.

A German Sunday

Sunday afternoon means Kaffee und Kuchen — coffee and cake with family or friends — and a Spaziergang, a walk in the park or the woods. Then at 8:15 pm many people switch on ARD for the crime series Tatort, a Sunday-evening tradition since 1970. Do your shopping on Saturday and let Sunday simply be a day off.

Today's German words

Word	Meaning
der Ruhetag	day of rest, closing day
die Sonntagsruhe	Sunday rest
geschlossen	closed
geöffnet	open
der Rasenmäher	lawnmower
der Spaziergang	walk

Shopping on Saturday, Brötchen and a walk on Sunday! Einen schönen Sonntag! ☕