UK Holiday Pay Calculator

Every worker in the UK — full-time, part-time, casual, or zero-hours — is entitled to 5.6 weeks of paid holiday a year. Turning that principle into a number is where the arguments start, because "a week" means something different for a Monday-to-Friday employee than for someone whose hours change weekly. For fixed patterns the maths is short: days per week × 5.6, capped at 28 days. For irregular-hours and part-year workers, the law (following the 2024 reforms that resolved years of case-law confusion) sets accrual at 12.07% of hours worked in each pay period, and permits rolled-up holiday pay — a 12.07% uplift paid on each payslip instead of paid time off, as long as it's itemised separately. This calculator covers both modes: pick your pattern, enter days per week or hours worked and pay rate, and get your entitlement in days, hours, and pounds.

Holiday pay disputes are among the most common employment claims in the UK, and most trace back to arithmetic done wrong or not at all: casual staff never told they accrue anything, part-timers given a flat 20 days regardless of their pattern, overtime excluded from holiday pay rates when regular overtime legally must be included. For workers, knowing the 12.07% figure means being able to check a payslip in ten seconds. For small employers, applying it correctly avoids claims that can reach back two years. And on leaving a job, accrued untaken holiday must be paid out — a number worth verifying on every final payslip.

The 5.6-week entitlement equals 28 days for a five-day week (5.6 × 5) — bank holidays can be counted within it, not on top, unless your contract says otherwise. The 28-day statutory cap means a six-day-a-week worker still gets 28 days. The 12.07% rate comes from the ratio 5.6 ÷ 46.4 — statutory holiday divided by the weeks actually worked — so accrual mirrors hours precisely. Where rolled-up pay is used, the same 12.07% is applied to each period's pay and must appear as a separate payslip line.

1. Pick your working pattern. Fixed days per week, or irregular/casual hours. The legal calculation differs — that's the fork in the road.
2. Fixed: enter days per week. Include half-days as 0.5. The calculator applies 5.6 weeks and the 28-day cap, and shows monthly accrual for pro-rata situations like starting mid-year.
3. Irregular: enter hours worked. Hours in whatever period you're checking — a week, a month, a quarter — plus your hourly rate to price the accrued holiday.
4. Check the pay rate used. Holiday pay must reflect normal remuneration: regular overtime, commission, and shift premiums are included by law, averaged over 52 paid weeks for variable earners.
5. Verify rolled-up arrangements. If your employer rolls up holiday pay, look for the separate 12.07% line on each payslip — bundling it invisibly into the hourly rate isn't compliant.

• Giving every part-timer "20 days". Entitlement scales with the individual pattern — 5.6 × their days — and a flat allowance shortchanges some patterns while overpaying others.
• Paying casual staff nothing for holiday. Zero-hours and agency workers accrue 12.07% of hours from day one; "casual" is not an exemption.
• Excluding overtime and commission from holiday pay. Regular overtime, commission, and allowances count as normal remuneration and must be reflected, averaged over 52 paid weeks.
• Hiding rolled-up holiday pay inside the hourly rate. It must be a separate, identifiable payslip amount — an "inclusive" rate without itemisation doesn't discharge the obligation.
• Assuming bank holidays are extra. The 8 bank holidays can lawfully form part of the 5.6 weeks; whether they're additional depends entirely on the contract.

• The quick mental check for casual work: about 7 minutes of holiday per hour worked (12.07% ≈ 1/8.3).
• Leaving a job? Accrued untaken holiday must be paid in your final pay — days accrued = annual entitlement × fraction of the year worked, minus days taken.
• Only 4 of the 5.6 weeks derive from EU law and must be taken as actual leave in-year; treatment of the extra 1.6 weeks (carry-over, payment) has slightly more contractual flexibility.
• Holiday keeps accruing during sick leave and family leave — long absences don't zero the balance.
• Employers: publish the accrual method in the contract and staff handbook; ambiguity is what turns a rounding difference into a tribunal claim.

UK holiday maths reduces to two numbers worth memorising: 5.6 weeks for fixed patterns and 12.07% of hours for irregular ones. Everything else — bank holidays, rolled-up pay, final-pay settlements — follows from applying the right one to the right worker at the right pay rate. Check your own figure once a year and on every job change; it's ten seconds of arithmetic that regularly turns out to be worth hundreds of pounds.

• UK Sick Pay Calculator — holiday accrues even during sickness
• UK Maternity Pay Calculator — leave accrues through maternity too
• UK Redundancy Pay Calculator — final pay includes accrued holiday
• Percentage Calculator — quick percentage arithmetic

• GOV.UK — Holiday entitlement calculator (gov.uk) — The official entitlement tool
• GOV.UK — Holiday pay and entitlement reforms (gov.uk) — The rules behind 12.07% accrual and rolled-up pay