Intrinsic to the Ghost Month is veneration of the dead, where traditionally the filial piety of descendants extends to their ancestors even after their deaths.

Other festivities may include buying and releasing miniature paper boats and lanterns on water, which signifies giving directions to the lost ghosts and spirits of the ancestors and other deities.

[11]: 301, 302  [note 2] The sutra records the time when Maudgalyāyana achieves abhijñā and uses his newfound powers to search for his deceased parents.

Maudgalyayana then asks the Buddha to help him; whereupon Buddha explains how one is able to assist one's current parents and deceased parents in this life and in one's past seven lives by willingly offering food, etc., to the sangha or monastic community during Pravarana (the end of the monsoon season or vassa), which usually occurs on the 15th day of the seventh month whereby the monastic community transfers the merits to the deceased parents, etc.,[12]: 185  [note 3] [11]: 293  [note 4] [13]: 286  [note 5] The Theravadan forms of the festival in South and Southeast Asia (including Cambodia's Pchum Ben) are much older, deriving from the Petavatthu, a scripture in the Pali Canon that probably dates to the 3rd century BC.

[14] The Petavatthu account is broadly similar to that later recorded in the Yulanpen Sutra, although it concerns the disciple Sāriputta and his family rather than Moggallāna.

[16][17] Family members offer food and drink to the ghosts and burn hell bank notes and other forms of joss paper.

Families pay tribute to wandering ghosts of strangers so that these homeless souls do not intrude on their lives and bring misfortune.

Traditionally Chinese opera was the main source of entertainment but the newer shows, concerts, dramas, wars, and so forth are referred to as Getai.

[21] Fourteen days after the festival, to make sure all the hungry ghosts find their way back to hell, people float water lanterns and set them outside their houses.

[22] They are performed by groups of singers, dancers, entertainers, and opera troops or puppet shows on a temporary stage that is set up within a residential district.

Other areas like North Sumatra, Riau, and Riau islands also conduct live concerts known as Getai (Mandarin simplified Chinese: 歌台; traditional Chinese: 歌臺; pinyin: gētái) like those in Malaysia and Singapore, and there are also times when observers conduct Tomb sweeping known as Sembahyang Kubur to respect ancestor spirits and garner luck.

This means that practitioners take extra precautions and caution others of making important decisions when it comes to relationships, professions, businesses, and finances.

People avoid practices like, making life-changing decisions, getting married or engaged, starting new businesses, moving to a new home, traveling, signing contracts, making impulsive major financial decisions, committing to big professional projects, inaugurations, buying or selling off high priced possessions such as cars, phones, or real estate properties, staying late out at night especially kids and elderlies, making noise or whistling at night, leaving food or hanging clothes out after sunset and leaving them overnight since their human-like shape may invite spirits, or even taking pictures at night, wearing black clothes, tapping people on the head or shoulders as it may affect their luck, picking up coins or strange items you find since these may belong to the dead, or even constantly talking to oneself, or going to cemeteries alone, or answering unknown whispers or sobbing, or being constantly close to bodies of water, or constantly talking about ghosts or death.

Besides these many avoidances, practitioners also make offerings and prayers for the souls of the dead, such as burning spirit money, lighting incense, and laying out food like fruits and drinks on home or temple altars or cemetery tombs or graves or mausoleums of deceased relatives that people during this month also start to visit.

[31] During the month, people avoid surgery, buying cars, swimming, moving house, marrying, whistling, and going out or taking pictures after dark.

[32][33][34][35] This festival is known as Tết Trung Nguyên[36] and is viewed as a time for the pardoning of condemned souls who are released from hell.

It is a ceremony conducted after death as part of traditional Sri Lankan Buddhist funeral rites and is known as mataka dānēs or matakadānaya.

[51] Like related festivals and traditions in other parts of Asia, the deceased are believed to come back to earth for fifteen days and people make offerings to them.

[52] Chūgen (中元), also Ochūgen (お中元), is an annual event in Japan on the 15th day of the 7th month, when people give gifts, especially to their superiors.

[55] It has since been transformed over time into a family reunion holiday during which people from the big cities return to their home towns and visit and clean the resting places of their ancestors.

In 2019, Obon was held on the same date in Kansai, Okinawa, and the Amami Islands, as August 15 on that year, was also the 15th day of the 7th lunar month.

The performance of Shraddha by a son during Pitru Paksha is regarded as compulsory by Hindus, to ensure that the soul of the ancestor goes to heaven.

The scripture Markandeya Purana says that if the ancestors are content with the shraddhas, they will bestow health, wealth, knowledge and longevity, and ultimately heaven and salvation (moksha) upon the performer.

This day is known as Hari Raya Galungan and celebrations typically last over two weeks, often in the form of specific food and religious offerings along with festivities.