Almost every worker in the UK is entitled to 5.6 weeks of paid holiday a year. For someone working five days a week that is 28 days, and the statutory minimum is capped at 28 days however many days a week you work. Part-time workers get the same 5.6 weeks in proportion to their days or hours, so three days a week gives 16.8 days, and workers with irregular hours accrue holiday at 12.07% of the hours they work. Bank holidays can be counted within the 28 days; there is no separate right to them. Employers can offer more, and many do, but not less.
What 5.6 weeks means in practice
| Working pattern | Statutory minimum a year |
|---|---|
| 5 days a week | 28 days |
| 6 days a week | 28 days, capped |
| 4 days a week | 22.4 days |
| 3 days a week | 16.8 days |
| 2.5 days a week | 14 days |
| 37.5 hours a week | 210 hours |
| 20 hours a week | 112 hours |
| 16 hours a week | 89.6 hours |
For anyone whose days vary in length, entitlement is better expressed in hours: 5.6 times the weekly hours. A worker doing 20 hours over four short days has 112 hours of leave, which buys more days off than a worker doing 20 hours over two long days, because each day taken costs fewer hours. Fractions of a day are rounded up by most employers and never rounded down below the statutory figure. The holiday entitlement calculator gives the figure for any days or hours pattern, for a full year or a part year, and for irregular-hours workers.
Bank holidays
England and Wales have eight bank holidays in most years, Scotland nine and Northern Ireland ten. There is no statutory right to take them off or to be paid extra for working them; a contract that gives “20 days plus bank holidays” and one that gives “28 days including bank holidays” both meet the minimum for a five-day worker. Part-time workers whose days do not fall on Mondays, when most bank holidays land, should receive a pro rata share of them rather than none, and the fairest arrangement is to give everyone their 5.6 weeks in hours and treat bank holidays as days taken from that pot. Our shift pay calculator covers the enhanced rates some employers pay for working them.
Starting or leaving part way through the year
In the first year of a job holiday accrues month by month at one twelfth of the annual entitlement, and employers can insist it is taken as it builds up. A five-day worker who starts on 1 July in a leave year running from January is entitled to about 14 days for the rest of that year. On leaving, untaken accrued holiday must be paid: someone leaving on 30 September with none taken is owed about 21 of their 28 days at their normal daily rate, and an employee who has taken more than they accrued can have the excess deducted only if the contract allows it. Our redundancy pay guide covers holiday pay alongside notice and statutory redundancy pay.
Irregular hours and part-year workers
For leave years starting on or after 1 April 2024, workers on zero-hours or variable contracts and those who work only part of the year, such as term-time staff, accrue holiday at 12.07% of the hours worked in each pay period, which is 5.6 weeks expressed as a proportion of the 46.4 working weeks in a year. A worker who does 120 hours in a month accrues 14.48 hours of leave; 40 hours accrues 4.83. Employers can instead pay rolled-up holiday pay, adding 12.07% to every payslip in place of paid time off, provided it is shown as a separate line, and workers still have the right to take unpaid time away. Before April 2024 the same workers were often paid at 12.07% under a practice the Supreme Court had ruled unlawful for part-year workers, which is what the reform regularised.
How holiday pay is calculated
Holiday pay must be a normal week’s pay. For workers on fixed hours and pay that is the ordinary weekly wage. For anyone whose pay varies, through overtime, commission, shift premiums or changing hours, a week’s holiday pay is the average of the previous 52 weeks in which they were paid, skipping weeks with no pay and looking back up to 104 weeks to find 52. Regular overtime and commission that form part of normal remuneration must be included, so a worker who regularly earns £100 a week of overtime should not drop to basic pay on holiday. The overtime pay calculator shows what regular overtime adds to weekly earnings and therefore to holiday pay.
Carrying holiday over
The 5.6 weeks divides into four weeks from EU-derived law and 1.6 weeks from UK law. The four weeks must normally be taken in the leave year, except where sickness or family leave prevented it, when it carries over for up to 18 months; the 1.6 weeks can be carried into the next year if the contract or a written agreement allows. Employers must give workers a reasonable opportunity to take their leave and must not pay in lieu of the statutory minimum except on termination. Notice to take leave is normally twice the length of the leave requested, and an employer can refuse dates with notice equal to the length of the leave.
Common questions
How many days’ holiday am I entitled to? 5.6 weeks a year: 28 days for a five-day week, 22.4 days for four days and 16.8 for three. Six-day workers are capped at 28.
Do bank holidays count towards my 28 days? They can. There is no separate right to bank holidays, so a contract of 20 days plus 8 bank holidays meets the minimum for a five-day worker.
How is holiday worked out for part-time staff? The same 5.6 weeks multiplied by the days or hours worked each week. Working in hours avoids unfairness where day lengths vary or bank holidays fall on non-working days.
How does holiday accrue on a zero-hours contract? At 12.07% of hours worked in each pay period for leave years from 1 April 2024, or as rolled-up holiday pay of 12.07% on top of each payslip.
What is holiday pay for variable earnings? The average weekly pay over the last 52 paid weeks, looking back up to 104 weeks, including regular overtime and commission.
Am I paid for untaken holiday when I leave? Yes. Accrued but untaken statutory holiday must be paid on termination at your normal rate of pay.
Information, not legal advice. The entitlement, cap and accrual rate are the statutory rules set out on gov.uk: holiday entitlement rights and in the Working Time Regulations 1998 as amended from 1 January 2024; worked figures are from the site’s calculator. Contracts can improve on the minimum, so check yours before acting on them.