Best Skills to Learn During Dashain and Tihar Festival Holidays (2026)

Quick answer: Dashain 2026 runs 11 to 25 October, with Vijaya Dashami (main tika day) on Wednesday 21 October. Tihar runs 7 to 11 November, with Laxmi Puja on Sunday 8 November and Bhai Tika on Wednesday 11 November. Government festival holidays are 17 to 23 October and 8 to 12 November, which is 12 days off. Use them to start one free skill and finish a small project.

The best skills to learn during these festival holidays are the ones you can start with free tools and finish as a small project in about a week: graphic design in Canva, video editing, digital marketing basics, HTML and CSS, Python, Excel data analytics, accounting basics and AI prompting.

Dashain (दशैं) and Tihar (तिहार) are the two biggest festival holidays (बिदा) in Nepal, and most guides to the Dashain Tihar holidays 2026 cover dates and rituals only. This guide does both. First it explains each festival and its key days for 2026. Then it shows what to do in the Dashain holidays as a student: how +2 students, college students and fresh graduates can use part of the break to start a job-ready skill without missing family time. If you are looking for the best skills to learn in Nepal 2026, or free skills to learn online in Nepal, every skill below comes with a free tool, a festival-themed mini-project and an honest time estimate.

Dashain 2026: dates, meaning and traditions

Dashain is Nepal's longest and most important festival. It lasts 15 days and celebrates the victory of good over evil, linked to Goddess Durga's defeat of the demon Mahishasura and to Lord Ram's victory over Ravana. In 2026 it runs from Ghatasthapana on Sunday 11 October to Kojagrat Purnima on Sunday 25 October. Families gather, elders give tika and jamara to younger relatives, and many people fly kites, play cards and ride bamboo swings. Offices, schools and banks close for the main days.

Dates follow the 2083 BS calendar (Nepali Calendar: Dashain 2026). The exact tika time (sait) is announced each year by the Nepal Panchanga Nirnayak Samiti, so check the official announcement before the day.

Tihar 2026: dates, meaning and traditions

Tihar, also called Deepawali and Yamapanchak, is a five-day festival of lights and the second biggest festival in Nepal after Dashain. Each day honours a different being: crows, dogs, cows, oxen and brothers. Families light oil lamps (diyo), draw rangoli at the door and welcome Laxmi, the goddess of wealth. In 2026 Tihar runs from Saturday 7 November to Wednesday 11 November. Laxmi Puja falls a day earlier than usual, on the same day as Kukur Tihar.

The festival calendar and official government holiday schedule are not necessarily identical. Check the Ministry of Home Affairs’ 2083 government and public holiday notice for the applicable dates.

Festival holidays Nepal 2026: how many days do you really have?

Dashain holiday how many days? The Ministry of Home Affairs' 2083 BS holiday list gives government offices seven days for Dashain and five days for Tihar, which is 12 days in total (summary of the notice by Pradhan Law). Vijaya Dashami on 21 October falls inside the Dashain holiday, and Laxmi Puja and Bhai Tika fall inside or next to the Tihar holiday. Schools and colleges may set different dates, so check your own calendar. This table turns the dates into a learning plan.

The hours are a planning estimate, not a guarantee. About 36 hours is enough to finish one beginner project, not to master a skill.

Why use the Dashain and Tihar holidays to learn a skill?

Three facts explain why this break is worth using:

• Nepal is online. DataReportal counted 16.6 million internet users and 14.8 million social media user identities in Nepal in October 2025, plus 32.4 million mobile connections at the end of 2025 (Digital 2026: Nepal). Businesses compete for those people on screens, which is why digital marketing, design and video skills are visible everywhere.
• Skills are changing fast. Employers surveyed by the World Economic Forum expect 39 percent of workers' core skills to change by 2030. AI and big data, networks and cybersecurity, and technological literacy are the fastest-growing skills (Future of Jobs Report 2025).
• Time is the real limit. The plan above gives you about 36 hours until the end of November. That is enough to finish a first project, which is the best proof that you can start a skill.

What to do in Dashain holidays for students: choose your skill in five minutes

Pick one skill, not five. Find the row that matches what you already enjoy, then check that its hours fit the 36-hour budget above.

9 skills to learn during the Dashain and Tihar festival holidays

These are the skills to learn during Dashain holidays and in Dashain and Tihar generally. Each has a free way to start, a festival-themed mini-project and a clear finish line.

1. Digital marketing (SEO and social media basics)

• Why it fits the season: Shops, banks and brands compete hardest for attention in festival weeks, so you can study live campaigns.
• Start with: How search, social media and email marketing work. Use Google Trends to see what people in Nepal search around Dashain and Tihar, then take a free course on Google Skillshop.
• Mini-project: A five-post, one-week social media calendar for a real or imaginary local shop's Tihar sale, with captions and hashtags.
• Done when: You can explain SEO, social media marketing and paid ads in your own words.
• Go deeper: Digital Marketing training in Nepal and the Digital Marketing career roadmap.

2. Graphic design (Canva first, then Figma)

• Why it fits the season: Greeting cards, posters and offers are everywhere, so you see good and bad design all day.
• Start with: Canva Design School for layout, colour, fonts and spacing.
• Mini-project: A Tihar greeting poster and a Dashain card, each in two colour versions.
• Done when: You can say why you chose each colour and font.
• Go deeper: Graphic Design training in Nepal.

3. Video editing (CapCut and DaVinci Resolve)

• Why it fits the season: Family gatherings give you footage to practise on. Ask permission before you post anyone's video.
• Start with: CapCut on a phone, or the free version of DaVinci Resolve on a computer with the official DaVinci Resolve training. Learn cutting, music and captions.
• Mini-project: A 60-second Dashain highlights reel.
• Done when: You have exported one finished video.
• Go deeper: Video Editing course in Nepal.

4. UI/UX design (Figma)

• Why it fits the season: Festive shopping, delivery and payment apps get heavy use, so you notice what frustrates you.
• Start with: Figma's free plan and the Figma Help Center for frames, text, buttons and simple prototypes.
• Mini-project: Redesign one screen of an app you used this Dashain, and write down three problems your design fixes.
• Done when: You have one finished screen and a short note explaining your choices.
• Go deeper: UI/UX Design training in Nepal and the UI/UX career roadmap.

5. HTML and CSS (web development basics)

• Why it fits the season: A greeting web page is a small, fun first project.
• Start with: HTML headings, paragraphs, links and images, then CSS for colour and layout. Follow the MDN guide to learning web development and practise in Skill Shikshya's online HTML compiler.
• Mini-project: A one-page Dashain greeting site.
• Done when: The page opens in a browser and passes the W3C Markup Validator without errors.
• Go deeper: MERN Stack training in Nepal for the full web development path.

6. Python programming for beginners

• Why it fits the season: Festival shopping lists and budgets are ideal beginner programs.
• Start with: Variables, input, if/else statements and loops. Follow the official Python tutorial and practise in the online Python compiler.
• Mini-project: A festival budget calculator that adds up item prices and shows how much money is left.
• Done when: The program runs without errors and handles at least three items.
• Go deeper: Python training in Nepal.

7. Data analytics (Excel and Google Sheets)

• Why it fits the season: Tihar shopping means lots of small numbers to track. AI and big data also lead the World Economic Forum's list of fastest-growing skills.
• Start with: Sorting, filters, SUM and AVERAGE, charts and pivot tables, using Microsoft's Excel training.
• Mini-project: A sheet of your festival spending (use sample numbers if you prefer privacy) with a chart of the biggest categories.
• Done when: You have a chart and two sentences saying what the data shows.
• Go deeper: Data Analytics and Business Intelligence training and the guide to the scope of data analytics.

8. Accounting basics (ledger and Tally)

• Why it fits the season: Tihar, and Laxmi Puja in particular, is a natural moment to think about how money is recorded and managed.
• Start with: Debit and credit basics, then an income and expense ledger. When you are ready, try a trial of TallyPrime.
• Mini-project: A one-week ledger for an imaginary small shop, using sample sales and expenses.
• Done when: Total debits equal total credits.
• Go deeper: Professional Accounting training in Nepal.

9. Generative AI (prompting for study and work)

• Why it fits the season: You only need a phone or laptop and curiosity.
• Start with: Writing clear prompts with a role, context, task and format, using the free Prompting Guide. Always check the answers, because AI can be confidently wrong.
• Mini-project: Ask an AI assistant to turn your chosen skill into a seven-day learning plan, then check it against reliable sources and edit it.
• Done when: You have a plan you trust and a list of at least two mistakes you caught.
• Go deeper: Generative AI and AI Agents course.

Stay Safe Online During the Festival Season

Learning online means more time on apps and messages, and festive season online scams in Nepal are a real risk. Nepal Police registered 20,526 cybercrime complaints in fiscal year 2082/83 (mid-July 2025 to mid-July 2026), up from 18,926 the year before. Only 161 cases were filed and 155 people arrested in the same period (The Himalayan Times). Police say complaints show more scams by fraudsters posing as bank or wallet representatives, fake gift, lottery and parcel offers, romance scams, false foreign-employment promises and fake online job offers sent on Telegram, WhatsApp and Instagram.

Young people are especially exposed. A 2024 FIU-Nepal analysis, cited in a Kathmandu Post editorial, found that 70 percent of the individuals involved in cyber-enabled fraud were aged 19 to 30, and many young people were being used as money mules. Five habits keep you safe:

Follow these precautions:

• Never share your one-time password (OTP), PIN or account recovery codes.
• Be cautious of jobs and earning schemes that require upfront registration fees.
• Never lend your bank or digital wallet account to someone who promises a commission.
• Verify website addresses before entering login or payment details.
• Enable two-step verification on important accounts.
• Report cybercrime through the Nepal Police Cyber Bureau.

If cybersecurity interests you, browse the SkillShikshya course directory to explore relevant training options.

Free learning or a structured course?

Free tutorials are a sensible way to test your interest before investing money. They work particularly well when you can plan your own learning, practise consistently and evaluate your progress.

A structured course may be more useful when you need a clear curriculum, feedback on projects, guidance from an instructor or help building a portfolio.

Consider structured training when you repeatedly get stuck, struggle to choose what to learn next or want a more systematic path towards a career.

Before enrolling, compare the curriculum, instructor experience, project work, feedback process, fees and career support. Do not assume that completing a short course automatically guarantees a job.

You can explore IT courses in Nepal at SkillShikshya and compare programs that match your interests and current skill level.

Conclusion: pick one skill and finish one project

You do not need to spend every festival holiday studying to make progress. Choose one skill, practise in short sessions and complete one small project you can show to a friend, teacher or potential mentor.

A finished beginner project gives you a clearer idea of what you enjoy, what you need to improve and whether you want to continue learning.

If you need help choosing a learning path, visit SkillShikshya to explore available courses and career guidance.