Public duties are performed by military personnel, and usually have a ceremonial or historic significance rather than an overtly operational role.

Since September 2018, the Honour Guard Battalion of the Ministry of Defense of Armenia has been responsible for performing public duties at the President's Residence in Yerevan, the national capital. A pair of ceremonial guards are posted at two sentry boxes in the front of the residence and are relieved in a brief guard mounting ceremony and an exhibition drill. Guards are posted every weekend in the afternoon and evening hours and on national holidays.

The service branches of the Canadian Armed Forces typically maintains one or more public duties detachments and units. Public duties have been performed throughout the country, with public duties having been performed at various provincial capitals, typically at the legislature, or the official residences of the lieutenant governors. However, public duties in Ottawa and Quebec City are the only regularly scheduled performances in the country.

Public duties in Ottawa is formally the responsibility of two regiments of foot guards, the Canadian Grenadier Guards, and the Governor General's Foot Guards; with one of their main tasks being the provision of sentries for public duties in support of the Government of Canada in Ottawa. The two regiments of foot guards, along with the Governor General's Horse Guards, based in Toronto, make up Canada's Household Division. Public duties in which these regiments take part in includes mounting the guard at Parliament Hill; and Rideau Hall, the official residence for the Monarch, and the Governor General of Canada. The two units are also tasked with mounting the guard of honour for visiting dignitaries. Public duties were also performed by the Canadian Guards until 1970, when the unit was reduced to nil-strength, and moved to the Supplementary Order of Battle.

The Canadian Army also operates a summer public duties detachment known as the Ceremonial Guard, which assumes public duties in Ottawa from late-June to late-August. The Ceremonial Guard is made up of regulars or reservists of the Canadian Army, Royal Canadian Air Force, and the Royal Canadian Navy. Public duties undertaken by the Ceremonial Guard includes sentry duties at the National War Memorial, Rideau Hall, as well as performing the Changing of the Guard ceremony in Parliament Hill, and the Fortissimo Sunset Ceremony. Members of the Ceremonial Guard wear the uniforms of the Canadian foot guards, as they have historically staffed the summer public duties detachment, before membership in the Ceremonial Guard was opened to the entire Canadian Armed Forces. The Ceremonial Guard are considered an ad hoc detachment, as its members are drawn from various units of the armed forces, and does not constitute a permanent unit in the Canadian Forces' order of battle.

The Canadian Armed Forces also maintains a National Sentry Program, where its members perform sentry duties at the National War Memorial from early-April to 10 November, the day before Remembrance Day. The program formally falls under the command structure of the Ceremonial Guard, although its volunteers are permitted to wear the ceremonial dress uniforms of their respective units/service while performing public duties at the war memorial.

Public duties at the Citadelle of Quebec, a military installation in Quebec City, are carried out by the Royal 22nd Regiment. The regiment carries out public duties at the Citadelle of Quebec from late-June to Labour Day, which falls on the first Monday of September.

The military installation serves as the home garrison for the regiment, as well as the secondary official residence for the Monarch, and Governor General of Canada. The regiment has carried out public duties at the Citadelle since 1928, excluding a brief hiatus from 1939 to 1945, due to the Second World War.