How much annual leave do NHS staff get?

The national figures come straight from Table 6 of Section 13 of the NHS Terms and Conditions of Service Handbook, which applies to Agenda for Change staff in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. They are for a full-time week and exclude the 8 general public holidays, which are added on top.

NHS Wales gave staff one extra day on appointment from the 2021/22 leave year (paragraph 13.1.1). The Handbook says Northern Ireland staff also have ten general public holidays, so check your trust's wording if you work there. The Handbook states these in days: in hours, using a 7.5-hour standard day, 27 days is 202.5 hours, 29 days is 217.5 hours, 33 days is 247.5 hours and 8 public holidays is 60 hours.

NHS annual leave for part-time staff: hours by contract

Part-time leave is your full-time leave multiplied by your contracted hours divided by 37.5. For public holidays the Handbook adds a rounding rule: part-time staff get no less than pro rata, rounded up to the nearest half day (paragraph 13.6). The table shows annual leave and public holidays together, in hours, assuming 7.5-hour shifts, for staff on England, Wales or Northern Ireland terms.

Each cell is annual leave plus public holidays. If your shifts are not 7.5 hours, use the calculator: it counts in your own shift length, which is what the Handbook means by calculating leave on an hourly basis for non-standard shifts (paragraph 13.5). A nurse on 37.5 hours working three 12.5-hour shifts, for example, gets the same hours as a colleague on five 7.5-hour days, but fewer, longer days off.

Annual leave accrual calculator: holiday accrued to date

Holiday "accrues" as the leave year goes on. The simplest accurate method is daily: your full-year entitlement divided by the days in the leave year, multiplied by the days you have been employed so far.

Some trusts work in whole months or weeks rather than days, and some round to the nearest half day, so a payroll figure can differ slightly from the calculator. The Handbook does not prescribe the method for joiners and leavers, so treat the result as a planning figure and confirm it with your line manager or HR.

Annual leave hours to days (and days to hours)

Rota systems often show leave in hours; contracts and managers talk in days. The conversion depends on how long your normal day is:

That last row is why the "27 days" headline can mislead on a long-day rota: it is 27 standard days of leave, which is fewer individual 12.5-hour shifts. The hours figure is the one that stays fair, and it is the one to compare with colleagues.

Holiday entitlement for any UK employer

Outside the NHS, the legal minimum under the Working Time Regulations is 5.6 weeks' paid leave a year, capped at 28 days (gov.uk). Your contract may be more generous, and your employer can count bank holidays towards it.

Irregular hours and part-year workers

If your hours change week to week, or you only work part of the year, holiday builds up as you work. For leave years starting on or after 1 April 2024, gov.uk says it accrues at 12.07% of hours worked. Work 1,000 hours and you have built up 120.7 hours of holiday, which is 16.1 days if your shifts are 7.5 hours. Choose "Any UK employer", then "Irregular hours or part-year" in the calculator above. Term-time-only and zero-hours workers use the same option: add up the hours you have worked in the holiday year so far.

Bank holidays and your leave

NHS general public holidays are a separate 8-day entitlement. Staff who work one are owed equivalent time off in lieu at plain time rates, in addition to the pay for working it (paragraph 13.4); our bank holiday pay guide covers the enhanced rate. Easter can shift the count in a leave year, which is why the calculator flags years with more than 8. To turn your leave and the bank holidays into the longest breaks, use the Bank Holiday Leave Planner, which lists the 2027 and 2028 dates for all four nations from gov.uk.

Annual leave and maternity leave

You keep building up leave and public holidays during paid and unpaid maternity leave. That can leave you with a large balance to organise around the leave year end, so plan it early. The "Maternity leave" tab shows, for each leave year the leave touches, how much you build up before it starts, during it and after you return, and it works out the earliest date leave can start from your due date (11 weeks before the week the baby is due). For pay during leave, use the Maternity Pay Calculator, and see the maternity leave entitlement guide.

Carry-over, long-term sickness and the leave year

There is no national NHS carry-over rule. The Handbook leaves arrangements for carry over to local agreement (paragraph 19.2), so check your trust's policy. Most NHS trusts run their leave year from 1 April to 31 March, but not all. Leave you could not take because you were off sick is handled differently from ordinary carry-over, and ACAS says up to 4 weeks can be carried over and taken within 18 months. See how NHS sick pay works and use the Sick Pay Calculator to see what a period off would pay.

How we calculate: method, assumptions and sources

The calculator works in hours, day by day across your leave year. It uses the Handbook's service tiers, switching to the next tier on the day you reach five or ten years if you leave that option on, pro-rates by contracted hours against the full-time week, applies the half-day rounding rule to part-time public holidays and counts leave in the shift length you enter. Statutory mode uses 5.6 weeks capped at 28 days, or 12.07% of hours worked.

• Assumed, not stated in the Handbook: a new service tier applies from the day you reach it, joiners and leavers are pro-rated by day, and the leave year runs on the dates you choose.
• Not modelled: local buy-and-sell-leave schemes, trust-specific rounding, time off in lieu balances and unpaid leave.
• Your contract and trust policy always win. Use this for planning, then confirm with HR.

Sources: NHS Terms and Conditions of Service Handbook, Sections 13, 15 and 19 and Annex 28 (NHS Employers); gov.uk holiday entitlement; gov.uk maternity leave; gov.uk bank holidays; ACAS on carrying over holiday. Last checked October 2026. See our editorial policy. FrontlinePay is independent and not affiliated with the NHS.