How much paid holiday am I entitled to, and how does it build up?

Last reviewed: 12 July 2026

Working out how much paid holiday you're owed shouldn't feel like guesswork. This guide breaks down the rules for full-time, part-time, and irregular-hours workers, so you can check your own figures with confidence.

Topics

Length of service Pay Working time

Legislation covered

Working Time Regulations 1998

Most people know they get paid holiday from work. Fewer know exactly how much, or how the number is worked out when their hours change from week to week.

The legal minimum

The legal minimum is 5.6 weeks a year for a full-time workerA legal category that sits between employee and self-employed. Workers are entitled to certain rights including national minimum wage, paid holiday, and protection from unlawful deduction from wages, ..., 28 days if your working week is the standard five days.

Bank holidays are not automatically added on top of this. Whether they count towards your 5.6 weeks or come free depends on your contract, so check it rather than assume.

If you work part-time

Part-time holiday is a straight proportion of the full-time entitlement. Someone working three days a week gets three-fifths of 5.6 weeks, which is 16.8 days. The maths scales with your regular pattern.

If your hours change from week to week

This is where it gets less obvious, and where employers sometimes get the calculation wrong.

Two different rules can apply, depending on your contract: a defined “irregular hours worker” or “part-year worker” (categories set out in law since 1 April 2024) accrues holiday at 12.07% of the hours actually worked in each pay period. Anyone on a permanent contract who falls outside those specific categories, most notably term-time-only staff on a year-round contract, is still entitled to the full 5.6 weeks, calculated from your average pay over recent working weeks, not shrunk down to match how much of the year you actually worked.

That second point matters, and it can work in your favour. A Supreme Court case confirmed that a permanent worker’s holiday is not automatically cut down just because they only work part of the year (see our case study, working part of the year doesn’t mean your holiday shrinks to match). If your employer is applying a flat 12.07% reduction without checking which category you actually fall into, you could be underpaid.

Rolled-up holiday pay

Some employers add a percentage on top of your normal pay instead of paying you separately when you take leave. This is called rolled-up holiday payA way of paying holiday pay as an extra percentage added to your normal wages each pay period, instead of paying you separately when you take leave. It's only lawful for irregular hours and part-year ....

It is only lawful for irregular-hours and part-year workers, on leave years starting on or after 1 April 2024, and it has to appear as a clearly identified, separate amount on your payslip, not buried inside your hourly rate. Outside that specific situation, rolled-up pay is not allowed.

Carrying leave over

You can normally only carry over unused statutory leave in limited situations, mainly where you could not take it because of sickness or a period of family leave. Otherwise, it is generally use it or lose it within the leave year.

That said, if an employer has let staff carry leave over for years as a matter of practice, that pattern can harden into a genuine contractual right, not just a favour it can withdraw at will. We have seen this play out in a real case, where decades of an employer letting holiday roll over turned into a binding right worth hundreds of thousands of pounds (see our case study on Ageli v Sabtina).

Getting paid for leave you have not taken

If you leave a job with statutory holiday still owed, your employer has to pay you for it rather than letting it disappear. That holds whatever the reason your job ends, resignation, dismissal, or redundancyA dismissal that occurs when your employer no longer needs the work you do, either because the business is closing, a workplace is closing, or the requirement for employees to carry out that kind of w..., and even if your employer becomes insolvent afterwards (see what you’re owed if your employer becomes insolvent, and our case study on holiday pay surviving an employer’s insolvency).

What your employer has to record

Employers have specific legal duties to keep records of your hours and how your holiday payThe pay you receive for the paid annual leave you're entitled to under UK law, worth at least 5.6 weeks a year for most workers. It's usually calculated from your normal pay, though the exact method d... was worked out. See what records your employer has to keep about your hours and holiday for the full detail.

If your employer’s figures still don’t add up after checking all this, you can book a call to talk it through.

FAQs

Frequently asked questions

How much paid holiday am I entitled to?

The legal minimum is 5.6 weeks a year, which works out at 28 days if you work a standard five-day week. Part-time workers get a straight proportion of this based on their working pattern.

Are bank holidays included in my holiday entitlement?

They're not automatically added on top. Whether bank holidays count towards your 5.6 weeks or come free depends on your contract, so check it rather than assume.

How is holiday worked out if my hours change every week?

It depends on your contract type. Irregular hours and part-year workers accrue holiday at 12.07% of hours actually worked, while permanent workers outside those categories, such as term-time-only staff, keep the full 5.6 weeks based on average pay, not a reduced amount.

What happens to unused holiday if I leave my job?

Your employer has to pay you for any statutory holiday you haven't taken, whatever the reason your job ends, including resignation, dismissal, or redundancy.