Ask Lemmy

UK. I get about 30 days plus bank holidays, pretty standard at my firm that people push it up to the max. Biggest perk I get is being able to work in between days off remotely, so I can be away for 3 weeks and work 5 days, so it would only cost me 10 days off. Its great for traveling.

Daughter is a teacher at a private school, she gets about 17 weeks or 85 days plus the 1 bank holiday that doesn't fall inside school holidays. Thats after teacher training days, which are days the teachers have to be at school but the kids do not. I would kill for that allocation, but not the dealing with other peoples kids every day part.

U.S. (California)

• unlimited vacation time (my boss very much lets me use it too)
• 40 “sick” hours a year
• “ bereavement leave “ (death in family)
• 12 holidays

I will admit I am lucky for being in the US. It most likely helps that I work for one of those evil Silicon Valley tech companies.

I have 4 week of vacation per year can't move them. Boss is pretty chill so he give us 2 extra. They are not paid vacation, but i get canada EI for those.

We also have 13 (14?) holiday These are paid by money taken from my salary each week( +- 15%) and given back twice year a in a lump sum (btw 3k-5k depending on the hours you worked) a month before our 2 week mandated vacation.

I'm also permanently on the canada EI. I just went and look it up, i could go 34 week without working (minus the 4 mandatory vacation week) and they would pay me 668$/ week, but i have to stay in canada to get that.

UK, 25 days as standard (not including paid bank holidays) plus my employer has the option to buy/sell up to 5 days so I usually buy 5 extra. Also, if you have left over holiday days, you can carry over 5 to the next financial year.

Additionally, the standard legal of 9 months maternity leave.

Also, unlimited paid sick days providing you don't take the piss; longer than 3 days you should ask for a note from the GP. Longer than 2 weeks you should arrange a meeting to discuss the situation and what (if any) adjustments can be made.

I will also point out that mental conditions must be treated the same as physical conditions so if you need to take a mental health day then you can.

Also my job is very flexible about working arrangements.

The standard is hybrid working, 2 out of 5 days in the office. But depending on what your job is you could be fully WFH or full-time in the office.

If you feel you can only work part-time and your manager agrees then you can.

And the contracted hours are 37.5 per week and flexible start so you must be available between the core hours of 10am to 12pm and from 2pm to 4pm, and as it's the UK Fridays you can finish at 12. Providing you've logged enough hours for the week, if you want to finish early you can or take a longer lunch break to run an errand.

Oh and the cherry on top is the company tries to match annual pay rises with inflation and give a very good reason if they can't fully match it. That's not very common in the UK and one of the main reasons, aside from the fact that it's a nice place to work, why I've stayed with them because I don't feel pressured to move jobs to stop my pay getting eroded by inflation.

Switzerland, 25 days + bank holidays. + the week between 24.12 to 02.01.

US, self employed (HVAC, family business) so if we don't work, the business (and by extension, us) don't make any money. That being said, we set our own schedule, so if we want to take time off, we can.

Germany

I've been off work for three or four years now. Long Covid is a bitch. The paperwork was monstrous but now me and my wife get paid by a combination of the state's pension, health insurance so my wife gets paid for caring for me and my unable-to-work (can't think of the proper name) insurance.

But usually I'd get 26 to 30 vacation days per year.

UK. 30 days plus Bank Holidays as paid leave. Also, we have a flexible working system where we can work additional hours to accrue up to five days' leave. Longest continuous period I've taken off was three weeks. It's also WFH four days a week.

When I was applying for this job I was offered - and accepted - a job at an American company which paid a few thousand more but didn't do flexi hours or WFH. It actually felt pretty good letting them know I wouldn't be starting and why.

USA
I currently have 80hrs of vacation and 40hrs of sick-time + a floating holiday
Also the major holidays
And a winter shutdown (~one and a half weeks)

Japan gives me 20 days a year, can bank up to 40. Plus public holidays

Germany.

• 30 vacation days.
• 16 public holidays.
• Unlimited sick days.

These are all paid, all working days.

I started this year with 9 vacation days from last year, I had to take them before the end of March, so I just randomly took a couple of weeks in Feb and Mar.

I usually align my vacation days with my kids school holidays, but I take 2-3 weeks continuously in the summer, usually late August.

US, I just got to offer stage with a company and the PTO was 10 days... I'm originally from the UK, and previously worked with startups from other countries, so this is shocking to me. More infuriating was the response from my friend group when I complained about it. "Yeah that's pretty standard" and I'm like "ok but it's also shit?"

In the UK, for a university. 26 days + 8 days bank holidays. I've been offered the chance of 'buying' an extra 10 days (salary sacrifice, spread over the year), I might go for it.

Sweden. 30 days of PTO per year.

I usually do three weeks in summer, two over Christmas and save the rest for random extended weekends when the public holidays align.

Also, I have about 90 days of paid, and 45 barely paid days parental leave left to take out. There was a total of 480 days for me and the Mrs to share in-betweenst ourselves per kid. I took four months off. Plus another 10 daddy-days to use immediately after baby was born.

Switzerland - 20 days is the legal limit, but we get 30 with one week around Christmas + New Year's Eve being mandatory.

I also got a special perk where I work 90% but due to a limitation of our system where we enter PTO, every Friday I take off doesn't count against my PTO budget (rather than only every second Friday). I have not told anyone.

Germany 30 days

UK here. I get 30 days paid leave a year, and will have 2 or 3 weeks away on vacation throughout the year and use the rest of the days for just chilling.

My employer will literally hassle me to use all the days, and is not happy if I don't take my full entitlement.

US - 0

None at all, no sick, no holiday, no federal holiday, absolutely no PTO. If I don't go in I simply don't get paid.

Brazil.
30 days + a lot of holidays.
At least 2 years for sickness if I'm not mistaken.

USA, CA, civil service, IBEW. I'm between 5 and 15 years (different PTO for different service lengths).

15 days vacation, all federal plus 5 floating holidays, and 10 sick days.

It's 10 days vacation between 1 and 5 years, and 20 after 15.

UK, 25 days annual leave which is the standard minimum plus bank holidays

Ontario, Canada.

Employees with less than five years of employment are entitled to two weeks of vacation time after each 12-month vacation entitlement year. Employees with five or more years of employment are entitled to three weeks of vacation time.

If you read the link you will find the employer is allowed to pay out your vacation time as a % of pay. This is very common especially in lower wage sectors. You are then supposed to save up the money yourself to pay yourself for vacation when you take time off. In effect, you don't get any paid vacation.

edit: I'll also add that you have no right to select WHEN you take your vacay. A friend of mine worked in a factory that shut down for 2 weeks in august for maintenance, painting, service the machines etc. So everyone had to take their vacation during that time; no choice. That is unusual but not prohibited.

https://www.ontario.ca/document/your-guide-employment-standards-act-0/vacation

9 public holidays

https://www.ontario.ca/document/your-guide-employment-standards-act-0/public-holidays

Employees are entitled to up to 3 sick leave days per year once they have worked for an employer for at least 2 consecutive weeks.

This is new since COVID. Which at the time it was introduced, mandated 10 days away from work.

https://www.ontario.ca/document/your-guide-employment-standards-act-0/sick-leave

There are also other kinds of leave like parental, bereavement and such, if you click any links you can see that in the sidebar. Nothing is very lush.

Everything is prorated to a 40 hour work week. Breaks don't count. So if you work 20 hours per week, you are entitled to half of what is specified.

Any employer can offer more than this, of course. Professionals and higher valued workers can get more. Unions or individuals can negotiate. But a lot of people only get the minimum. Or less. Enforcement is minimal. It's the honor system.

There are also exceptions like federal workers (government, airlines etc). And farm workers, who basically have zero rights of any sort.

Finland - and zero days, since I’m self-employed. On the other hand, I can take a day (or even a week) off whenever I feel like it, and I only need to work about three days a week to cover my living expenses.

At my previous job, I used to get somewhere between 30 to 40 days of paid time off per year. It varied depending on the year and how many public holidays landed on weekdays.

Norway: 25 working days. And the pay is 12% of whatever you earned the previous year.

On top of that there are the public holidays. 2025 list, lazy copypasta:

1 Jan Wed New Year's Day
17 Apr Thu Maundy Thursday
18 Apr Fri Good Friday
20 Apr Sun Easter Sunday
21 Apr Mon Easter Monday
1 May Thu Labour Day
17 May Sat Constitution Day
29 May Thu Ascension Day
8 Jun Sun Whit Sunday
9 Jun Mon Whit Monday
25 Dec Thu Christmas Day
26 Dec Fri 2nd Day of Christmas

USA, 2 weeks/year but they don't expire and I can roll them over if I want to.

I usually vacation for 3 weeks at a time, it's a good amount of time to spend on one place I've never been and see a bunch.

Czechia. I get 20 days off mandated from the state, plus some (12-ish?) public holidays, plus every day I donate blood (that's up to 5 days a year).

My job gives me 5 extra vacation days, and when I'm on sick leave, pays me the full 100 % of my salary.

I take vacations for as long as I need :) But mostly I try to chip away at my supply with one- or two-day vacations, usually around weekends and/or combined with public holidays. I am obligated to take vacation at the end of the year, and I always take 3-4 days for a yearly local metal festival.

Canada - Four weeks vacation. Five and a half years with the company.

Australia: 20 days PTO by law, 13 public holidays (depends on the state, but no less than 10 which are national), 10 separate days for use when sick or caring for someone who is sick. There's more entitlements for different scenarios but this is pretty much the baseline.

France - never got some since i always was in internship/short/seasonal contracts. I have huge free time in unemployment periods though, and some are 'paid' by social aids, around 1 week each month if i worked the previous one. The legal basis is 30 days otherwise.