World Habitat Day is held on the first Monday of October and launches Urban October. The day centres around the global observance, which is held in a different country each year with keynote speakers and roundtable discussions focused on a specific theme. World Habitat Day was first celebrated in 1986 in Nairobi, Kenya, with the theme ‘Shelter is my right’.

On 3 October 2022, the Global Observance of World Habitat Day, under the theme Mind the Gap. Leave No One and No Place Behind, will look at the problem of growing inequality and challenges in cities and human settlements.