How Many Working Days Are in a Year? (UK & US 2026)
“How many working days are in a year?” sounds like it should have one tidy answer — but it depends on where you live, which holidays you observe, and whether the year is a leap year. If you are planning annual leave, working out a daily rate, pro-rating a salary, or scheduling a project, the number you actually need is weekdays minus public holidays, not just 365 divided by seven.
Here is the short version for the current year: 2026 has 261 weekdays. After public holidays that becomes roughly 253 working days in England & Wales and 250 working days for US federal workers. Below is exactly how those numbers are built so you can work out any year, region, or personal schedule yourself.
What counts as a “working day”?
A working day (also called a business day) is normally any weekday — Monday to Friday — that is not a public holiday. Weekends are excluded, and so are bank holidays in the UK or federal holidays in the US. That gives the standard five-day working week most employers, banks and payroll systems assume.
Two things change the total. First, the calendar: a common year has 365 days and a leap year has 366, so the count shifts by one day roughly every four years depending on which weekday the extra day lands on. Second, holidays: the UK observes 8 bank holidays in England & Wales (Scotland and Northern Ireland differ slightly), while the US observes 11 federal holidays. If a holiday falls on a weekend, it is usually “observed” on the nearest weekday, which keeps it inside the working-day count.
How to calculate working days in a year (step by step)
You can do this with nothing more than a calendar and a bit of arithmetic:
- Start with the total days. 365 for a common year, 366 for a leap year. (2026 is not a leap year, so 365 days.)
- Subtract the weekend days. A year contains 52 full weeks — that is 104 weekend days — plus 1 or 2 leftover days. Whether those leftover days are weekdays or weekend days depends on the day the year starts on.
- Count the weekdays that remain. For most common years this lands on 260 or 261; for leap years, 260, 261 or 262.
- Subtract public holidays that fall on a weekday. Ignore any holiday that lands on a Saturday or Sunday unless your region gives a substitute weekday for it — in which case count the substitute instead.
The result is your working-day total. To turn it into working days for your job, also subtract your contracted annual leave and any company-specific closure days.
Worked example: working days in 2026
2026 is a common year of 365 days that begins on a Thursday. Counting Monday-to-Friday dates across the whole year gives 261 weekdays. Now we remove the public holidays.
England & Wales (8 bank holidays, all on weekdays in 2026): New Year’s Day (Thu 1 Jan), Good Friday (Fri 3 Apr), Easter Monday (Mon 6 Apr), Early May (Mon 4 May), Spring (Mon 25 May), Summer (Mon 31 Aug), Christmas Day (Fri 25 Dec) and the Boxing Day substitute (Mon 28 Dec, because Boxing Day itself is a Saturday). That is 261 − 8 = 253 working days.
United States (11 federal holidays, all observed on weekdays in 2026): New Year’s Day, Martin Luther King Jr. Day, Washington’s Birthday, Memorial Day, Juneteenth, Independence Day (observed Fri 3 Jul, as 4 July is a Saturday), Labor Day, Columbus Day, Veterans Day, Thanksgiving and Christmas Day. That is 261 − 11 = 250 working days.
Those totals matter for money as well as scheduling. If you earn a salary of, say, £38,000 / $48,000 / €44,000 and want a rough daily rate, divide by your working days: £38,000 ÷ 253 ≈ £150 per day in England & Wales, and $48,000 ÷ 250 = $192 per day for a US federal schedule. HMRC in the UK and the IRS in the US both work from annual figures, so a per-day rate is only ever an estimate — useful for quoting a freelance day rate or costing a day of leave, not for filing.
FAQ
How many working days are in an average year?
Before holidays, most years have about 260–262 weekdays. A common rule of thumb is 260 working days a year, but the true figure swings between 260 and 262 depending on the starting weekday and leap years. After subtracting national holidays you typically land in the low 250s: around 253 in England & Wales and 250 for US federal workers.
Do bank holidays count as working days?
No. A bank or federal holiday that falls on a weekday is removed from the working-day count, which is why the UK and US totals are lower than the raw 261 weekdays. Holidays that fall on a weekend are only counted if your region grants a substitute weekday — as happens with the 2026 Boxing Day and US Independence Day substitutes.
How many working days are in a month?
It varies from 20 to 23. In 2026, for example, February has 20 weekdays while July and December each have 23, before you remove any holidays that land in that month. To get an exact figure, count the Monday-to-Friday dates in the month and subtract any holidays.
This article is general information to help with planning, not financial or tax advice. Pay, leave entitlement and holiday rules vary by contract and country — check with your employer, HMRC or the IRS for figures that affect your pay or return.
Want the exact count for any date range? Skip the manual arithmetic and use our free Business Days Calculator to count working days between two dates, or explore all our Date & Time calculators to plan leave, deadlines and pay periods in seconds.