In some places, the services on weekdays during the Dormition Fast are similar to the services during Great Lent (with some variations). As with the other Fasts of the Church year, there is a Great Feast that falls during the Fast in this case, the Transfiguration (August 6), on which fish, wine and oil are allowed. The Dormition Fast is a stricter fast than either the Nativity Fast (Advent) or the Apostles' Fast, with only wine and oil (but no fish) allowed on weekends. In the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church and the Eritrean Orthodox Tewahedo Church, whose calendar is generally consistent with the Julian Calendar, the dates of the fast are from August 7 to August 22. In churches that follow the old or Julian Calendar, the fast is from August 14 to August 28. From August 1 to August 14 (inclusive) Orthodox and Eastern Catholics fast from red meat, poultry, meat products, dairy products (eggs and milk products), fish, oil, and wine. The Feast of the Dormition is preceded by a two-week fast, referred to as the Dormition Fast. It is testified to in some old Apocryphal writings, but neither the Orthodox Church nor other Christians regard these as possessing scriptural authority. This belief does not rest on any scriptural basis, but is affirmed by Orthodox Christian Holy Tradition.

The term Dormition expresses the belief that the Virgin died without suffering, in a state of spiritual peace. Hippolytus of Thebes, a 7th- or 8th-century author, claims in his partially preserved chronology to the New Testament that Mary lived for 11 years after the death of Jesus, dying in AD 41. The death or Dormition of Mary is not recorded in the Christian canonical scriptures.

In Western Churches the feast is known as the Assumption of Mary. The Armenian Apostolic Church celebrates the Dormition not on a fixed date, but on the Sunday nearest 15 August. for those following the Julian Calendar) as the Feast of the Dormition of the Mother of God. It is celebrated on 15 August (28 August N.S. The Dormition of the Mother of God is a Great Feast of the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox and Eastern Catholic Churches which celebrates the 'falling asleep' (death) of Mary the Theotokos ('Mother of God', literally translated as God-bearer), and her being taken up into heaven (bodily assumption).

Mount and blade feast