Christmas trading hours

Special trading hours arrangements apply for retail shops over the Christmas period each year and depend on the category of the retail shop.

Extended trading applies to areas throughout Queensland for the 3 Sundays before 18 December and from 18–24 December each year.

Exempt shops

Exempt shops, except for the sub-category of independent retail shops, have unrestricted trading hours and may trade during the Christmas period.

Independent retail shops as a sub-category of exempt shops

Independent retail shops generally have unrestricted trading hours and can trade during the Christmas period but must remain closed on Christmas Day, except if they are a predominantly food and/or grocery store, which can trade without restriction.

However, specific trading hour restrictions apply for licensed premises. For more information, read Trading hours for liquor licensees.

Non-exempt shops

Trading hours for non-exempt shops

These extended hours do not apply to non-exempt shops selling motor vehicles or caravans.

* If this day is a Sunday, the opening time is taken to be 9am for all non-exempt shops which are in a type 4 trading area. Otherwise, refer to trading hours for non-exempt shops.

Non-exempt shops in type 1 trading areas and all non-exempt hardware shops which have an earlier opening time or a later closing time than set out above may continue to trade those hours on the 3 Sundays before 18 December.

All non-exempt shops must close at 6pm on 24 December.

Special trading hours apply to:

• Westfield Chermside shopping complex
• and
• Westfield Garden City shopping complex.

For more information, read a summary of the 2023 Christmas trading hours (PDF, 147KB) including car and caravan sales.