How Many Business Days Are in a Year?

A calendar year has 365 or 366 days. Take out the Saturdays and Sundays and 260, 261 or 262 weekdays remain, depending on the weekday the year starts on and whether it is a leap year. Take out the public holidays that land on those weekdays and what is left is the year's business days. On the US federal calendar that comes to between 249 and 251 in every year from 2024 to 2029. The figure moves because the calendar does: a year has more or fewer weekdays depending on the day it starts on, and a New Year's Day that falls on a Saturday is taken on December 31 of the year before.

Across borders there is no single answer, because each country keeps its own public holidays and a few keep a different weekend. In 2026 this calculator counts 242 business days in China and 254 in Saudi Arabia, with the United States at 250.

How the Count Is Calculated

A year contains 52 full weeks, which account for 104 weekend days. A common year has one day beyond those 52 weeks and a leap year has two. An extra day that is a Saturday or Sunday adds nothing, so a common year has 260 or 261 weekdays and a leap year 260, 261 or 262.

From that weekday total, subtract the public holidays that land on a weekday. On the US federal calendar a holiday that falls on a Saturday is observed on the Friday before, and one that falls on a Sunday on the Monday after, as the Office of Personnel Management sets out under 5 U.S.C. 6103(b) and Executive Order 11582. Either way the observed day removes one weekday from the count. Where a country does not move a weekend holiday to a weekday, that holiday costs no business day at all.

Business Day Counts by Year

The table counts the US federal holidays on the dates in OPM's schedule for each year, which is the Friday or Monday where a holiday falls on a weekend, for every year this site carries.

2027 absorbs an extra closure: New Year's Day 2028 falls on a Saturday, so for most federal employees the holiday is Friday, December 31, 2027. That gives 2027 12 closures and leaves 2028 with 10.

2024 is a leap year that begins on a Monday, so it has 262 weekdays and 251 business days. 2028 is a leap year that begins on a Saturday, so it has 260 weekdays and 250 business days.

A leap day only adds a business day when the calendar lets it, which is why two leap years can land on different totals.

Why the Answer Depends on the Country

Each country has its own public holidays, so the total is country-specific. Here is 2026 across 8 countries, ordered from the fewest business days to the most. Each row counts the holiday set this calculator uses for that country, the one listed with its source on the country's calculator page and in the sources register. That is a nationwide set, except that the United Kingdom's row counts the bank holidays of England and Wales. Days that a single state, province or city adds are not included.

Leaving Israel aside, the spread is 12 business days. Each of the other countries in the table has a two-day weekend, which takes 104 days out of 2026, while the public holidays that land on a working day take between 7 and 19.

Israel's row is a different count. For Israel this calculator counts the operating days of ZAHAV, the Bank of Israel's payment system: Sunday to Friday, with Fridays and holiday eves short business days that count in full. Only its 52 Saturdays are weekend days, so its 303 business days are not comparable with the rows above it. Israeli government ministries on the five-day week work Sunday to Thursday (Civil Service Regulations, paragraph 31.111, in the National Insurance Institute's copy dated 29 May 2022), so this is not their count; the calculator's Working week setting offers Sunday to Thursday (government ministries) when Israel is selected.

China's row needs a qualifier. Around its long holiday closures, China moves working days onto weekends: article 7 of the national holiday measures allows the rearrangement, and the notice of the State Council's General Office for 2026 names six such working days: Sunday, January 4, Saturday, February 14, Saturday, February 28, Saturday, May 9, Sunday, September 20, and Saturday, October 10. This calculator counts those dates as weekend days, so its China total leaves those six working days out.

The weekend still matters, in a quieter way. For Egypt, Qatar, and Saudi Arabia this calculator counts a Friday-Saturday weekend. There a holiday on a Friday falls into the weekend and costs no working day, while a holiday on a Sunday, an ordinary working day in those countries, does. For how the workweek itself differs, see the Sunday-to-Thursday workweek guide and the working week around the world.

None of these totals includes the days a single state adds. Where a state adds its own days, the local count is lower. Bavaria adds Epiphany, Corpus Christi and All Saints' Day statewide under Article 1 of its holiday act, which leaves Bavaria with 252 business days in 2026, against 254 on Germany's nationwide set. Assumption Day, a holiday only in Bavaria's majority-Catholic municipalities, is not in that count. The state, province, and canton guide covers that layer, and the country directory lists the weekend rule and holiday set for each supported country.

Monthly and Quarterly Context

A year of 250 business days averages 20.8 a month, but no month sits on the average. In the United States in 2026, the fewest business days in a month is 19 (February and November) and the most is 22 (March, April, July, and December). Quarters differ too, because they have different numbers of calendar days (Q1 has 90, or 91 in a leap year, Q2 has 91, Q3 and Q4 have 92) and different numbers of holidays. In 2026 Q1 has 61 business days, Q2 63, Q3 64 and Q4 62, with 3, 2, 2, and 4 federal holiday closures respectively. If you bill or forecast by quarter, plan with those four numbers, counted for the year in question, and not with a quarter of the annual total. The business days in a month guide breaks the monthly figures down in detail.

Why This Number Matters

One business day is 0.4 percent of a year of 250 business days, so a plan that spreads a fixed annual amount over the year's business days moves by that share for every day it miscounts. On the US federal calendar, the totals in the table above lie at most 2 days apart. Between countries the gap is wider: a 2026 plan that puts the US figure of 250 on work done in China, where this calculator counts 242, is off by 8 days. The same holds for a quarter, where one holiday is a larger share of a shorter period.

Calculating Business Days for a Custom Period

For any period other than a full calendar year, such as a fiscal year, a project timeline, or a contract term, the Business Day Calculator counts the business days between two dates for any supported country, on the weekend it uses for that country. When a date falls in a year its holiday data does not cover, it shows a notice naming the years it does cover. For a single year at a glance, Working Days in 2026 shows the month-by-month breakdown across national calendars.

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