What it does
This calculator counts the working days between two dates — every day except Saturdays, Sundays, and, if you choose, UK bank holidays. Enter a start and end date (both are counted) and switch "exclude UK bank holidays" on or off depending on whether holidays should count as working days for your purpose. Everything runs in your browser; no dates are sent anywhere.
How it works
The calculator walks every calendar day from the start date to the end date inclusive, and sorts each one into a bucket: a weekend day (Saturday or Sunday), a bank holiday that falls on a weekday, or a working day. Working days is simply the total minus the other two.
UK bank holidays (England & Wales) aren't all fixed calendar dates. New Year's Day, Christmas Day and Boxing Day are fixed dates but move to the next available weekday if they fall on a weekend — and Christmas Day and Boxing Day are handled together, since a weekend clash can push both back. Good Friday and Easter Monday shift every year with the date of Easter, calculated from the standard astronomical-Easter algorithm. The early May, spring, and summer bank holidays are defined as "the first Monday in May", "the last Monday in May" and "the last Monday in August" respectively, so they're always already on a weekday.
Worked example
From 2024-12-20 to 2025-01-06 inclusive is 18 days. Of those, 6 fall on a weekend and 3 are UK bank holidays (Christmas Day, Boxing Day and New Year's Day all land on weekdays across this particular range) — leaving 9 working days.
Common uses
- Project and delivery planning: working out how many working days are available before a deadline.
- Contracts and notice periods: many notice and cooling-off periods are specified in working days, not calendar days.
- Payroll and invoicing: counting billable or payable working days in a period.
- Annual leave planning: checking how many working days a holiday actually uses up.
- Shipping and SLA estimates: converting a "working days" delivery promise into an actual calendar date.
Frequently asked
Which bank holidays does this use?
England & Wales bank holidays: New Year's Day, Good Friday, Easter Monday, the early May bank holiday, the spring bank holiday, the summer bank holiday, Christmas Day and Boxing Day. Scotland and Northern Ireland observe some different dates.
Are both the start and end date counted?
Yes — the range is inclusive of both endpoints.
What happens if I turn off "exclude UK bank holidays"?
Bank holidays that fall on a weekday are then counted as working days, and only weekends are excluded.
Does it matter which date I enter first?
No. If the start date is later than the end date, the calculator swaps them automatically and returns the same result either way.
You can read how every ToolHare tool is checked on the how we build and verify tools page.