Guide · Updated May 2026
UK Holiday Entitlement Explained: 2025/26
The Working Time Regulations 1998 give every UK worker the right to 5.6 weeks of paid annual leave — 28 days for a full-time five-day-a-week role. Sounds simple, but the detail is anything but. Bank holidays may or may not count. Part-timers pro-rate. Zero- hours staff use the 12.07% accrual method that the April 2024 reforms revived. Holiday pay must reflect 52 weeks of variable earnings, not just basic salary. This guide walks through every rule, with worked examples for full-time, part-time and irregular workers.
Working Time Regulations 1998
UK holiday law sits in the Working Time Regulations 1998 (WTR), the domestic implementation of the EU Working Time Directive. Two regulations matter most: Regulation 13 grants 4 weeks of paid leave (the original EU minimum), and Regulation 13A adds an additional 1.6 weeks introduced by the Labour government in 2007. The two together make up the famous 5.6-week statutory minimum.
The distinction between the 4 weeks and the additional 1.6 weeks matters in practice for two reasons. First, the 4 weeks must reflect a worker's "normal pay" including overtime, commission and shift premiums; the additional 1.6 weeks can legally be paid at basic rate only. Second, the 4 weeks cannot normally be carried over to the next leave year, whereas the additional 1.6 weeks can if both parties agree.
The WTR also set a maximum 48-hour average working week (which an adult can opt out of in writing), minimum rest breaks of 20 minutes for shifts over 6 hours, 11 hours of daily rest between shifts, and 24 hours of weekly rest. Holiday is the headline right but sits in a broader framework of working-time protections.
The 5.6-Week Statutory Minimum
Every "worker" — a broader category than "employee", covering casual staff, agency workers and most zero-hours staff — has the right to 5.6 weeks of paid leave per year. A "week" here means a worker's normal working week, not a fixed seven-day calendar week. So:
- Full-time, 5 days a week: 5.6 × 5 = 28 days
- 4 days a week: 5.6 × 4 = 22.4 days
- 3 days a week: 5.6 × 3 = 16.8 days
- 2 days a week: 5.6 × 2 = 11.2 days
- 6 days a week: still capped at 28 days (statutory cap)
The 28-day statutory cap is important: even if you work 6 or 7 days a week, the law caps statutory entitlement at 28 days. Employers can grant more by contract, but the law does not require it. The 28 figure also applies whether you measure in days or in hours (28 × 8 = 224 hours for a typical full-timer).
Bank Holidays: The Big Misconception
There is no legal right in the UK to take bank holidays as paid leave on top of the 5.6-week minimum. This is the single most widespread misunderstanding in UK employment. The 5.6 weeks is a single block — the employer can lawfully say "your 28 days includes 8 bank holidays", leaving 20 days of bookable leave.
England and Wales have 8 bank holidays in a typical year (New Year's Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, Early May, Spring, Summer, Christmas Day, Boxing Day). Scotland has 9 (substituting 2 January and St Andrew's Day for Easter Monday). Northern Ireland has 10 (adding St Patrick's Day and Battle of the Boyne). The exact pattern affects how contracts are drafted, especially for workers based in different nations.
Generous employers — particularly public sector, large finance and many tech firms — typically offer 25-30 days of paid leave PLUS bank holidays, putting total entitlement at 33-38 days. Retail, hospitality and small business contracts more commonly state "28 days inclusive of bank holidays" — entirely legal but unpopular with staff. Always check your contract before assuming.
Part-Time Calculation
Part-timers are entitled to the same 5.6 weeks of holiday as full-timers, pro-rated to their working pattern. The Part-Time Workers (Prevention of Less Favourable Treatment) Regulations 2000 require employers to offer holiday on a like-for-like basis with full-time colleagues.
A worked example: Ben works 3 days a week (24 hours) in a workplace where full-timers get 28 days plus 8 bank holidays (36 days total). Ben's entitlement is 3/5 × 36 = 21.6 days. If a bank holiday falls on one of his working days (typically Monday, the most common bank holiday day), he gets paid for it and it counts against his entitlement. If a bank holiday falls on a day he does not work, the contract should specify how it is handled — typically the worker gets a pro-rated extra day in lieu, though this is not legally required.
For shift workers and those with irregular weekly patterns, expressing entitlement in hours rather than days is usually cleaner: 5.6 × average hours per week = annual entitlement in hours. A worker doing 20 hours/week gets 112 hours of paid leave per year — they can take it in chunks that match their actual shift lengths.
Irregular Hours & 12.07% Accrual
For workers whose hours vary week to week — zero-hours staff, term-time-only employees, casual workers, agency staff — the day or week-based approach breaks down. Instead, holiday accrues at 12.07% of hours actually worked. The arithmetic: 5.6 weeks of holiday over a 46.4-week working year (52 − 5.6) = 5.6 / 46.4 = 0.1207 or 12.07%.
| Hours worked | Holiday accrued | At £12.21 NLW |
|---|---|---|
| 8 hours | 0.97 hours | £11.82 |
| 40 hours | 4.83 hours | £58.97 |
| 100 hours | 12.07 hours | £147.39 |
| 1,000 hours | 120.7 hours | £1,473.94 |
The 12.07% method was the long-standing UK norm until the Supreme Court's 2022 ruling in Harpur Trust v Brazel — a case brought by a term-time-only music teacher. That ruling found that part-year workers must receive the full 5.6 weeks of holiday regardless of how few weeks they actually worked, effectively giving them proportionally more holiday than full-year workers. The result was administrative chaos for employers of irregular-hours staff.
The April 2024 reforms reversed Brazel for irregular-hours and part-year workers, restoring the 12.07% method specifically for these categories. Regular-hours part-timers (e.g. someone reliably working 3 days every week) are unaffected and still use the simple pro-rata of 5.6 × days per week.
Holiday Pay & the 52-Week Reference
Paid holiday means paid at "a week's pay" per week of leave. For salaried workers on a fixed monthly wage this is trivial — they get their normal monthly salary regardless of when they take leave. For everyone else, the law requires that holiday pay reflects normal earnings, not basic salary alone.
The reference period for calculating a week's pay was extended from 12 weeks to 52 weeksin April 2020 to smooth out seasonal earnings. The calculation: look back 52 weeks immediately before the holiday starts, total pay received in those weeks (including overtime, commission, shift premiums, allowances and any other "normal" payment but excluding genuinely one-off bonuses), divide by the number of weeks worked. Weeks with no pay are skipped and replaced with earlier weeks, going back as far as 104 weeks if necessary.
Worked example: Aisha is a hairdresser earning £400/week basic plus variable commission averaging £150/week. Total annual pay across 50 weeks worked: £400 × 50 + £150 × 50 = £27,500. Average weekly pay = £27,500 / 50 = £550. Her holiday pay per week off must be £550, not the £400 basic alone. Employers paying only basic salary during holiday weeks are systematically underpaying — a common cause of Employment Tribunal claims.
Carrying Over Unused Leave
The default rule is that statutory holiday must be taken in the leave year it accrues. Carrying forward is permitted only in specific circumstances:
- Up to 8 days of the additional 1.6 weeks (Regulation 13A leave) can be carried over by mutual agreement between worker and employer to the next leave year.
- The full 4 weeks of Regulation 13 leave can be carried forward where the worker was unable to take it because of sickness, maternity or other family leave — typically usable up to 15 months after the end of the original leave year.
- Up to 20 days of Regulation 13 leave can be carried over for up to 2 years where it was not reasonably practicable to take leave due to COVID — a temporary provision introduced in March 2020 and largely now expired.
- Contractual holiday above the 5.6-week minimum can be carried over or lost entirely depending on what the employment contract says.
Many employers operate a "use it or lose it" policy that complies with the statutory floor by allowing carry-over for sickness and family leave only. Employees often perceive this as harsh but it is lawful in respect of the 4-week Regulation 13 entitlement, provided proper notice and opportunity to take leave were given.
Sick Leave & Maternity Accrual
Holiday accrues during sick leave at the normal rate, regardless of how long the absence lasts. The European Court of Justice case Pereda v Madrid Movilidad established that workers who fall sick during pre-booked holiday can convert those days to sick leave and reclaim the holiday for later use. UK employers must allow this with appropriate medical evidence.
Holiday also accrues during the full 52 weeks of statutory maternity leave. A returning mother may have accrued 28 days during her absence; she is entitled to take those days on return, and many employers allow her to use the accrued leave to extend the effective absence at the end of the maternity period (e.g. an extra 5-6 weeks paid at full salary). The same principle applies to statutory paternity leave (2 weeks), adoption leave (52 weeks), shared parental leave (up to 50 weeks) and parental bereavement leave (2 weeks).
Crucially, accrued holiday during family leave is at the contractual rate, not just statutory minimum. If your employer contracts for 33 days a year and you take 9 months of maternity leave, you accrue 33 × 9/12 = 24.75 days during the absence, not just the pro-rated statutory 21 days.
Unused Leave on Termination
When employment ends — by resignation, dismissal, redundancy or end of fixed term — the employer must pay for any accrued but untaken statutory holiday in the final wage. The calculation is pro-rated: total annual entitlement × (days worked in the leave year ÷ 365), minus days of holiday already taken in the year.
Worked example: full-time worker with 28 days statutory entitlement leaves on 30 September, with the leave year running April-March. Days served = 178 days. Accrued = 28 × 178/365 = 13.65 days. If they have already taken 8 days, they are owed 5.65 days of holiday pay at their normal daily rate. Many employers round to the nearest half or full day in the worker's favour.
Contracts cannot lawfully forfeit accrued statutory holiday on termination — this is a non-negotiable statutory right. Contractual holiday above the 5.6-week minimum can be forfeited if the contract clearly says so. During a notice period, employers can require the worker to take their remaining accrued leave (with notice equal to twice the leave being required), reducing the cash payout owed at termination.
The April 2024 Reforms
The April 2024 reforms — implemented by the Employment Rights (Amendment, Revocation and Transitional Provision) Regulations 2023 — substantially changed holiday rules for irregular-hours and part-year workers. The headline changes:
- Brazel reversed for irregular workers: The Supreme Court's 2022 ruling that part-year workers must get the full 5.6 weeks regardless of weeks worked no longer applies. Irregular-hours and part-year workers now accrue holiday at 12.07% of actual hours.
- Rolled-up holiday pay restored: Employers can pay holiday pay as a 12.07% uplift on each hour's wages rather than holding back pay for holiday weeks. The payslip must show the uplift separately. This is permitted only for irregular-hours and part-year workers — not for regular part-timers.
- 52-week reference period maintained: Where holiday pay is calculated traditionally (not rolled up), the 52-week look-back continues to apply.
- Sickness and family-leave carry-over codified: The existing case law allowing carry-over of unused leave because of sickness or family leave is now written explicitly into the regulations.
For employers of zero-hours staff, the rolled-up holiday pay option is administratively transformative. For workers, it removes the irritation of weeks with no pay during holiday but requires clear payslip disclosure and disciplined personal budgeting to cover unpaid holiday weeks.