Wild turkeys on a November lawn. The island’s flocks are everywhere from West Tisbury to the Edgartown road, and they have right of way; Thanksgiving week on the Vineyard begins by braking for them.
Martha's Vineyard from Thanksgiving week 2026 to the end of March 2027, month by month: which restaurants serve Thanksgiving and New Year's Eve, the Felix Neck Fall Festival and Light Up Oak Bluffs, Christmas in Edgartown, the exact February closure windows of the year-round restaurants, the winter ferry timetable, the 20 Miler and the Film Festival, weather averages and winter hotel rates.
The island has two winters. The first runs from Thanksgiving to New Year's Day, when the towns light their trees, the year-round restaurants set holiday menus and the Saturday boat still carries a crowd. The second runs from the first week of January to the end of March, when a third of the restaurants that survived December take their own vacation, the ferry runs half-empty, and the beaches belong to seals, surf-casters and whoever booked a $200 room that costs $600 in August. Our winter off-season guide explains why the season is worth it; this one is the calendar. Month by month from Thanksgiving week 2026 to the end of March 2027: what is open, what is closed and for exactly which weeks, what is on, how to get here, and what the weather actually does.
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Thanksgiving is Thursday, November 26, 2026, and the week around it is the busiest the island gets between Columbus Day and Christmas in Edgartown. Families who own or rent for the summer come back for the long weekend, the ferry parking lots in Woods Hole fill on the Wednesday, and the year-round restaurants that serve a holiday meal are booked by the middle of the month. Here is how the week worked in 2025, which is the best guide to 2026 until the menus post in early November; we will update the specifics as they appear.
Two practical notes. The Wednesday before Thanksgiving and the Sunday after are the two days of the whole winter when the Vineyard Haven boat and the Woods Hole lots feel like August; reserve a car crossing and arrive an hour early. And Thanksgiving Day itself closes nearly everything: the markets shut early on Wednesday, the Stop and Shops have closed on Thanksgiving Day in recent years, and the restaurants above are among the very few open, so the rental-house turkey needs to be in the fridge by Wednesday afternoon. The grocery guide lists holiday hours by store.
The Harbor View under its holiday lights at dusk. Bettini, at the far end of the porch, is the island’s Thanksgiving and New Year’s Eve dining room and stays open all winter.
December is the month the island decorates, and the reason to come is the three weekends in a row when a different town takes its turn.
Sunset is about 4:15 pm all month, the average high is 46 and the low 31, and December is the island's wettest month, so the lights are best seen from a car with the heater on and a coffee from Mocha Mott's.
Offshore Ale’s hand-lettered Christmas Day sign. The island’s only year-round brewpub closes exactly one day for the holiday and then a fortnight in February; the winter calendar below has every closure we could verify.
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The first week of January is the turn. The holiday visitors leave on the Sunday boat, the ferry drops to its traditional schedule of fourteen crossings a day, and the restaurants that stayed open through December start their own holidays. Average high 40, low 26, and about 25 inches of snow across the whole winter, most of it gone in a day or two because the ocean around the island holds the temperature above freezing more often than the mainland's does. This is the month for the island at its emptiest: Lucy Vincent and Squibnocket with nobody at the gate, seals hauled out on the Chappy side of Wasque, snowy owls on the Katama plains in an irruption year, the Land Bank trails with the leaves down and the water views open.
Known January closures from the Martha's Vineyard Times' 2026 year-round list, which the restaurants repeat most years: Alchemy in Edgartown closed January 1 to February 11; Rosewater closed through January 19; Sweet Life Cafe in Oak Bluffs closed for the month; The Attic in Vineyard Haven closed part of the month; Wicked Burger closed until February 2; Plane View at the airport reopening February 1. Everything else on the year-round list, from the Black Dog Tavern to Offshore Ale to Rockfish to State Road, is open in January, several of them on shortened weeks. The Martha's Vineyard Museum's Menagerie of Marvels exhibition runs to January 17, 2027, and the museum's cafe is one of the warmest rooms in Vineyard Haven.
Five Corners in a January snowfall. The island gets about half of Boston’s snow, and it rarely stays; the ploughs are out by morning and the boat runs unless the wind says otherwise.
February is when the year-round restaurants take their own vacations, and the closures cluster in the second half of the month. From the Times' 2026 list: Offshore Ale closed February 2 to 14; The Ritz closed February 15 to March 15; The Wharf in Edgartown closed February 16 to March 16; Beach Road in Vineyard Haven closed February 22 to March 22; Rockfish closed February 22 to March 4; State Road in West Tisbury closed February 22 to March 31. If you are coming for Presidents' Day weekend (February 13 to 15, 2027), most of those doors are still open; if you are coming the last week of February, plan meals around the Black Dog, Bettini, Alchemy (back from February 12), the Newes, Offshore Ale and the pizza places, and check the current year's list in our what's open year-round guide, which we update as the restaurants post.
February is also the coldest water of the year, 38 degrees, with the average high at 42 and the low at 27, and it is nor'easter season: one or two storms a winter shut the boat for a day. Build a spare day into any February trip. The annual Martha's Vineyard 20 Miler road race, usually a February fixture, moves to Saturday, March 6, 2027 this coming winter, starting at 11 am directly in front of the Steamship Authority terminal in Vineyard Haven.
Main Street the morning after a February storm: ploughed, salted, and open. The bakery, the bookshop and the pharmacy do not close for snow; the boat is the only thing that does.
March is the island's most unpredictable month, with a high of 46 and a low of 32 on average and a wind that can make either feel like January. It is also the month the calendar turns back on. The Martha's Vineyard 20 Miler runs March 6, 2027. The Martha's Vineyard Film Festival, the winter's cultural anchor, is announced for March 31 to April 4, 2027 at the Chilmark Community Center and the Film Center in Vineyard Haven; the 2026 edition was March 25 to 29, so late March is the safe assumption and the festival's own key-dates page is the source. Ocean Club in Vineyard Haven closes March 9 to 26 and Soigne in Edgartown briefly in mid-March; by the last week of the month Rockfish, The Ritz, The Wharf and Beach Road are back, and State Road returns April 1. The osprey usually return to the platforms at Felix Neck in the second half of the month; and the Steamship Authority's spring schedule brings more crossings, with Oak Bluffs boats returning in May.
The full list with hours is in our year-round guide; this is the winter core, the places that stay open through the whole calendar above, with the closure windows noted where the owners published them.
The winter rate card is the best argument for the season. The Harbor View, Mansion House, Hob Knob, Edgar Hotel, Nobnocket and the Vineyard Harbor Motel all stay open, with rooms from roughly $120 to $230 a night that run $500 and up in August; the where to stay guide and the off-season guide carry the ledger. Houses are the other option: winter rentals are monthly rather than weekly, and a November-to-April lease on a summer house can cost less per month than one August week. The vacation rental guide explains the market; for winter, ask an agency directly rather than a platform, because most winter leases never get listed.
The packing list covers the year; for winter add waterproof boots (the sidewalks flood at Five Corners before they freeze), a windproof shell over the down, a headlamp for the 4:15 dark, and a printed copy of your ferry reservation because the terminal Wi-Fi is not a promise. Pharmacies: Conroy in West Tisbury, the Vineyard Haven and Edgartown Stop and Shops, and the hospital in Oak Bluffs for anything urgent. Deer ticks are active on any day above freezing, so the rainy-day list and a tick check both still apply in January.
| Thanksgiving | Thursday, November 26, 2026; Felix Neck Fall Festival Friday; Light Up Oak Bluffs Saturday (pattern) |
|---|---|
| Christmas in Edgartown | December 10–13, 2026 |
| New Year's Eve | Bettini, Alchemy, The Ritz, Ocean Club; First Night at the Playhouse 6–8 pm (2025 pattern) |
| Ferry | Vineyard Haven only from October 23; 14 crossings a day; first 6:00 am, last 9:45 pm from Woods Hole |
| Average highs and lows | Nov 54/40, Dec 46/31, Jan 40/26, Feb 42/27, Mar 46/32 (Fahrenheit) |
| Snow | About 25 inches a winter, rarely on the ground more than a few days |
| Biggest closure window | February 15 to March 22: Ritz, Wharf, Beach Road, Rockfish, State Road all dark for some of it |
| 20 Miler | Saturday, March 6, 2027, 11 am, Vineyard Haven terminal |
| Film Festival | Announced for March 31 to April 4, 2027 |
| Hotel rates | Roughly $120–230 a night against $500 and up in August |
Thanksgiving and New Year's Eve details are the 2025 listings compiled by the island chamber of commerce, used here as the pattern for 2026; we will replace them with 2026 menus as they post in November. Restaurant closure windows are from the Martha's Vineyard Times' year-round dining list of January 15, 2026, and the owners change them each winter, so treat a specific date as a strong hint, not a promise. The ferry schedule is the Steamship Authority's published traditional timetable for October 23, 2026 to January 5, 2027. Weather averages are from our climate guide. The 20 Miler date is from the race's own site; the Film Festival dates from the festival's announced 2027 schedule; Felix Neck and Light Up Oak Bluffs from the Gazette calendar and the town's listings for previous years. Snow, holiday closures and the boat are all subject to the weather, which in winter is the whole story.
Island tip of the daySeasonalNo. 77 of 86
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