Almost every worker in the UK is entitled to 5.6 weeks of paid holiday a year. On a five-day week that comes to 28 days, and 28 days is also the legal ceiling, so someone working six days a week still gets 28. Your employer can count bank holidays as part of that 28, and plenty do. Anything above it is down to your contract.
That's the headline. The detail changes depending on how many days you work, whether your hours are fixed, and whether you work all year round.
Bank holidays
There's no legal right to have bank holidays off, and no rule that they come on top of your 28 days. England and Wales have 8 bank holidays a year, so a job offering "20 days plus bank holidays" is giving you exactly the statutory minimum. If your contract says "28 days plus bank holidays", you're getting 36 days, which is more generous than the law requires.
Part-time workers with regular hours
Part-timers get the same 5.6 weeks, just made of shorter weeks. Multiply the days you work by 5.6:
| Days worked a week | Statutory holiday |
|---|---|
| 1 | 5.6 days |
| 2 | 11.2 days |
| 3 | 16.8 days |
| 4 | 22.4 days |
| 4.5 | 25.2 days |
| 5 or more | 28 days (the cap) |
Your employer can round a figure like 16.8 up to 17, but they can't round it down.
If your days are different lengths, work in hours instead. Say you do 36 hours over four days of 9 hours each. 36 × 5.6 = 201.6 hours a year. Each day off uses up the hours you'd have worked that day, so that's 22.4 nine-hour days. Working in hours stops anyone being short-changed when a long day falls on a holiday.
Irregular hours and part-year workers: the 12.07% rule
For leave years starting on or after 1 April 2024, two groups build up holiday differently:
- Irregular-hours workers, whose paid hours are wholly or mostly variable under their contract. Zero-hours and casual contracts usually fall here. A fixed rotating shift pattern doesn't.
- Part-year workers, who only work part of the year and have periods of at least a week when they're neither working nor paid. Term-time staff are the common example.
Both accrue holiday at 12.07% of the hours they actually work in each pay period. The figure isn't plucked from the air: 5.6 weeks divided by the 46.4 weeks left in the year once you take that holiday is 12.07%.
Worked example: you do 22 hours in a weekly pay period. 22 × 12.07% = 2.66 hours of holiday. GOV.UK's guidance rounds to the nearest hour, with 30 minutes or more rounding up, so that week earns you 3 hours. Do 40 hours the next week and you earn 4.83 hours, which rounds to 5.
Rolled-up holiday pay
For the same irregular-hours and part-year workers, employers can choose to pay holiday as they go rather than when you take the time off. This is called rolled-up holiday pay, and it's 12.07% of your total pay for each period, on top of your normal wages.
If you earn £500 in a week, the rolled-up amount is £60.35. It has to be shown as a separate line on every payslip. When you then take time off, you won't be paid again for it, because you've already had the money. Put a bit aside if you can.
Rolled-up pay isn't allowed for workers with regular hours. Their holiday must be paid when it's taken.
What holiday pay should include
Holiday pay isn't always just basic pay. The guidance splits the 5.6 weeks in two:
- 4 weeks must be paid at your "normal" pay, which includes regular overtime, commission and certain bonuses.
- The other 1.6 weeks can be paid at basic pay.
Many employers pay all 5.6 weeks at normal pay to keep things simple. If you regularly work overtime and your holiday pay looks thin, this is the first thing to check.
Starting or leaving part way through the year
You get a share of the year's entitlement for the part you're employed. Start on 1 October 2026 in a job with a January to December leave year, working five days a week, and you're employed for 92 of the year's 365 days. 28 × 92 ÷ 365 = 7.06 days for the rest of that year.
When you leave, you must be paid for any statutory holiday you've built up and not taken. If you've taken more than you've built up, your contract may allow your employer to take the difference back from your final pay.
Carrying holiday over
As a rule you're expected to use your holiday within the leave year. The exceptions:
- By agreement: up to 8 days (the 1.6 weeks, for a five-day week) can be carried over if your employer agrees.
- Sickness: if you couldn't take leave because you were off sick, workers with regular hours can carry up to 20 days forward, and irregular-hours and part-year workers up to 28 days. It must be used within 18 months of the end of the leave year it was earned in.
- Maternity or family leave: you can carry leave over if you couldn't take it because of the leave.
- Your employer got in the way: if they refused to let you take it, didn't give you a reasonable chance to, or didn't warn you it would be lost, you can carry it forward.
Holiday keeps building up while you're off sick or on maternity leave, which is why these carry-over rules matter.
Check your own figures
The holiday entitlement calculator does the sums for fixed days, fixed hours, irregular hours and part-year starters and leavers. If you're off ill, the sick pay calculator shows what you'll get, and the pro rata salary calculator helps if you're moving to part-time.
Last reviewed October 2026.