Brighton Christmas Bin Collections: 2026 Dates Due December

Brighton & Hove City Council has not yet published its Christmas and New Year 2026 collection dates. It published last year’s on 17 December 2025 and the year before’s on 13 December 2024, so expect the 2026 list in the second or third week of December. What follows is last year’s schedule in full, which is the best guide to how the council handles the holiday, and this page will be updated the day the 2026 dates appear.

The quick answer

• 2026 dates: not yet published. The council released the 2025 list on 17 December 2025. Expect the 2026 list around the same time.
• Last year, Christmas week collections ran a day EARLY, not late: the Monday round was done on the Saturday before, and Tuesday to Thursday rounds each moved one day forward.
• Garden waste stopped for two weeks (last collection Friday 19 December 2025, back from Monday 5 January 2026) and tree recycling points opened on Monday 29 December.

What happened over Christmas 2025

The council’s release, Christmas and new year recycling and refuse collection dates, set out the revised days for kerbside refuse and recycling. The pattern is unusual: instead of pushing rounds back by a day after the bank holidays, the council pulled the Christmas week forward so that crews finished before Christmas Day.

Collections returned to normal days from Monday 5 January 2026. The council asked for refuse and recycling to be out by 6am on the revised day, and food waste caddies by 5am.

The year before was different. The 2024 release, published on 13 December 2024, moved every round back rather than forward: Christmas Day’s collection went to Friday 27 December, Boxing Day’s to Saturday 28 December, and the knock-on ran for more than two weeks, with normal days only resuming on Monday 13 January 2025. So the two most recent years used opposite methods. Do not assume 2026 will copy either; check the council’s list when it lands.

Communal bins

If you use a shared communal bin on the street rather than your own wheelie bin, none of this applies to you. Communal bins are emptied on a rolling daily round with no collection day, and the council’s revised-date tables only cover kerbside rounds. Our bin collection days page explains which of the two services your street is on.

Garden waste

Garden waste is a subscription service and it pauses over the holiday. In 2025 the council said: “Garden waste collections stop over Christmas and new year. The last collection will be on Friday 19 December, with the service resuming from Monday 5 January.” In 2024 the pause ran from Friday 20 December to Monday 6 January. Expect a similar two-week gap in 2026.

Real Christmas trees

The council runs drop-off points for real trees each January and composts them. In 2025/26 they opened on Monday 29 December 2025 and stayed open until Friday 6 February 2026; the council’s Recycle your Christmas tree page carries the map of sites and said there were 23 points across the city. Garden waste subscribers can instead leave the tree beside their garden waste bin on their usual day once collections restart.

Take the tree out of its pot and strip every decoration first. The council’s warning from January 2025, when trees were dumped beside communal bins, was blunt: leaving a tree on the pavement, road or next to a communal bin “is fly-tipping and you could be fined” (council release, 8 January 2025). Both recycling centres also take trees.

Recycling centre hours over Christmas

The Hove and Brighton household waste sites changed hours as follows in 2025, per the same council release: Christmas Eve 8am to 1pm, Christmas Day and Boxing Day closed, New Year’s Eve 8am to 1pm, New Year’s Day closed. Normal hours and the ID rules are on our tip opening times page.

Check your own street

The council’s collection day checker is updated with the festive dates once they are set, and it now shows whether the crew has already passed your road on the day. That is the authoritative place for your address; this page is the overview.

Still to be confirmed

• The 2026/27 revised dates themselves. Expected from the council in mid December 2026, based on the 17 December 2025 and 13 December 2024 publication dates.
• Whether the 2026 tree recycling points open on Tuesday 29 December 2026 to match last year.
• Recycling centre Christmas hours for 2026.

Separately, the council is moving the whole city to fortnightly refuse collections; our fortnightly bins page covers that change.

Sources: Brighton & Hove City Council: Christmas and new year collection dates 2025, Christmas collection date changes 2024, Recycle your Christmas tree, Recycle your Christmas tree, please use official sites (8 January 2025).