What's new
New destinations, data updates, and feature changes. Newest first.
The INSET checker now tells you how busy the day will be
Rarity was only half the answer. A training day almost no other school takes is worth nothing if it lands inside February half-term, and one shared with most of England can still be a quiet day out. Each day you enter now comes back with both numbers: how many other English schools are off with you, and the crowd score for that date across all 218 council calendars. Entry is a date field rather than a 275-cell grid, so the answer arrives in one step - the grid is still there for anyone who would rather point at it.
INSET day checker
Schools set their own INSET days, so no national list exists and nobody can tell you how unusual yours are. Enter your school's days and this page says how many other schools share each one, drawn from a sample of 401 English state schools. Most English schools take the same three days - 1 September, 2 September and 4 January - and the rest scatter across 110 more, so a day almost nobody else has is worth planning around. Figures are ratios, not percentages: they are a sampled estimate and are never mixed into the crowd score.
The trip-length picker no longer stops a day short
Choosing a date range capped the longest searchable trip one day below the range itself: pick 20-22 November and the longest trip on offer was two days, not three. The window covering your whole range was unreachable. Fixed - the picker now offers a trip as long as the dates you chose.
Crowd score badges now read the same on every page
A badge is set by the score itself, not by how that week ranks against the rest of a destination's year. A 23% window reads Quiet on the France page and on the homepage alike. Before, the same score could read Quiet on one page and Busy on another, and a green percentage could sit under a Busy badge. The calculation behind the number is unchanged — only the label it carries.
Dates beyond the published term data are no longer scored
Council term dates currently run to 31 August 2028. Searches past that date used to return 0%, the quietest score on the scale, when the honest answer was that no data exists for it. The finder now says so, and the date pickers stop at the last date covered. Weeks inside the covered years that show 0% are unchanged: that is term time, and it is real.
Destination tiles show the week they found
Each tile in the compare-destinations grid now carries its dates, not just a score. The grid finds each destination's own quietest window, so the weeks differ from tile to tile — worth reading alongside the percentage when comparing.
Dubai
The UAE federal school calendar is now on Offterm. Dubai's quiet-vs-busy pattern is set by UK and European visitors, not local schools: Christmas, February half-term and Easter are the crowded, high-price windows. Local schools break for the Jul–Aug heat, when residents leave.
Bulgaria
Bulgarian grades 1–3 finish 30 May — one of the earliest summer finishes in Europe. The Black Sea coast is fully open from June with no UK family demand until August. UK October half-term falls in Bulgarian term time.
Slovenia
Slovenian schools finish late June — four weeks before English schools. Lake Bled and Ljubljana are in full summer mode at near term-time prices. October half-term clashes with Slovenia's own autumn break.
Morocco
Moroccan schools close 4 July — 17 days before English schools. No Christmas break. UK October half-term arrives the day after Morocco returns to school. First long-haul destination on Offterm.
Compare destinations: find the quietest country for your dates
The finder now scores 15 destinations at once when no specific destination is selected. Each tile shows the best crowd score available within your date range. Click any destination to see its five quietest windows.
Sweden
Höstlov falls in the same week as UK October half-term, so Sweden is busy then. February is the opposite: Sportlov is staggered by region, and Stockholm is quiet during UK February half-term.
New York
NYC schools finish late June, three and a half weeks before UK summer begins. That gap is the quietest window to visit before UK families arrive.
Finland
Finnish schools finish late May, giving an 8-week quiet window before UK summer starts. Syysloma (October) falls in the same week as UK half-term.
Norway, Poland, and Denmark
Norway's autumn break falls in early October, three weeks before UK half-term. Poland has no October half-term, making it one of the quietest destinations during that UK peak week. Denmark's week 42 break ends just before UK half-term begins.
Florida and California
US schools finish in late May, creating a quiet early-June window at Disney World and Universal before UK families travel. Both states now appear in the destination finder alongside European destinations.
Trip planner on every destination and attraction page
The quietest-window finder was previously homepage-only. It now runs on every destination and attraction page, using that page's data directly.