How many working hours are in a year? A simple guide.

• A full-time UK employee typically works between 1700 and 1900 hours.
   
• Contract type, bank holidays, and leave entitlement can all affect total annual working hours, it's not one size fits all.
   
• Accuracy matters when it comes to calculating working hours for the year. Correct calculations support fair pay, accurate leave, and compliance with the Working Time Regulations 1998.

Well, yes, Molly Mae, that might be technically true, but it’s not quite the full story. We’re not all influencers and CEOs engaged in a constant hustle, and we don’t all work every hour under the sun (not advised, FYI), or even every day (god forbid we should take a holiday once in a while). So when you’re thinking about working hours, we very much don’t all have the same 24 hours in a day. Or in a week, month, or year. Inconvenient, isn’t it? 

That philosophical hot take, courtesy of a highly successful person on a highly unconventional career path, was meant to be inspirational. And perhaps it is, for some. For those less keen on working round the clock (guilty), perhaps not. And for anyone responsible for the staff roster, payroll accuracy, absence management or compliance with working time regulations, it sounds like an HR nightmare.

Because, yes, we all have 24 hours in a day, but we’re ideally not working all of them. And we can’t all work the same ones. So working out the exact total for yourself, or your team in the UK, is far from simple. But it’s necessary because that total must be both legally compliant and contractually correct. 

And let us tell you: 8,760 hours a year (24 x 365) is neither of those things – Molly Mae is really putting in a shift.

Calculating the number of working hours in a year (UK) is a complex yet foundational task that underpins everything from annual leave entitlements to hourly pay rates and pro rata calculations for part-timers.

Get it right, and your workload planning will be smooth sailing, your leave calendar will be beautifully balanced, and your forecasts will be spot on. But get it wrong, and you tip the first domino on a run of payroll errors, staff disputes and admin headaches…

But fear not, we’re here to give you the answer so you can step away from the spreadsheet and get back to your real job. So tear down your “same 24 hours” motivational poster and let’s talk about the hours that matter: actual working hours.

When calculating your working hour totals, you can’t just add up every hour you or your team spent at, doing, or thinking about work. There’s a law to think about. Specifically, the Working Time Regulations 1998. According to which, a ‘working hour’ is any time the worker is at the employer’s disposal and carrying out work duties. This is actually a bit more than just scheduled work (so your 9–5) and includes job-related training, travel for work (but not to work) and overtime. Getting this right is key, as the regs also stipulate a 48-hour average weekly working hours limit (unless opted out) and minimum rest periods. If you don’t know what counts as a working hour, you could end up non-compliant.

So we know what working hours are. But how many are in a year? If you’re just wanting the quick answer for your bog-standard full-time UK employee, look no further:

Assuming 261 working days in a year (365 days minus 104 weekend days – in a leap year, you’ll need to add a day, but we don’t here) and a standard full-time employment contract with 37.5 hours a week with 28 days’ statutory leave, the total gross number of working hours is 1,957.5. Take off 210 hours for annual leave, and you have a grand total of 1,747.5 net working hours.

Though 37.5 hours a week is standard, 40-hour contracts are pretty common in the UK. In which case, you’d be looking at: 2,088 gross hours, minus 224 hours’ leave, giving a total of 1,864 net working hours. 

You’ve also got to factor in UK bank holidays. Some employers include these in their annual leave entitlement; others offer them on top. If you’re offering them on top, that’s potentially another 75 or so hours you need to take off your total, depending on where you are in the UK.

One last thing – leap years. In a leap year, you’ll need to add another day/7.5 hours. So, for your standard full-time employee, the answer to our headline question is: somewhere between 1,700 and 1,900 hours.

But we aren’t all, and don’t employ all, standard full-time employees. The reality for most companies is a bit more complex. Sigh.

Using 1,745.5 hours as your full-time gold standard, the total working hours for any other type of contract will be a percentage of that figure. For example, a part-time worker doing 60% of full-time hours would be working 1,048.5 hours per year (1,747.5 x 0.60 = 1,048.5). 

You can also use this to work out their leave entitlement in hours (210 hours annual leave x 0.60 = 126 hours). 

Getting your net working hours figure is not just a theoretical exercise we do for the hell of it – maths can be fun, but not that fun – it’s the backbone of HR, payroll and compliance for your business. Small business owners/managers, HR teams and payroll admins all need to know this number so that they can effectively: 

• Work out annual salaries and hourly rates. The most direct application is that this ensures people are paid fairly. An accurate hourly rate is found by dividing annual salary by net working hours per year. Even when people aren’t paid hourly, you need a precise hourly rate to calculate overtime, sick pay, and average earnings accurately —figures that are needed pretty often. An hourly rate based on working days is much more precise than using the average weekly earnings rate, which will slightly overstate the hourly rate, so you’ll end up paying more over time.
   
• Manage staffing. The total net working hours figure determines your capacity. If you know that your team of 5 collectively has, for example, 8,737.5 hours each year, you can accurately forecast the volume of products and/or services you can deliver.
   
• Accurately track leave and work out holiday entitlements. All types of leave can be measured against the annual working hours. This is a super clear system that can be automated, meaning you can be sure you’re deducting the correct number of hours every time. Especially useful for part-time staff, where awkward calculations make things trickier if you’re doing things manually or with less precise systems.
   
• Ensure compliance. The Working Time Regulations set a maximum of 48 hours in an average working week over a 17-week rolling period. Knowing your expected net annual hours gives you a baseline to work from. If someone is consistently logging hours above this, it’s an alarm bell. It tells you that you could be non-compliant, the employee in question could be experiencing burnout, and your capacity model might be flawed, and you need more staff.

How many working hours are there in a year? There is a simple answer – 1747.5 net working hours – but the world of work is no longer straightforward. You can see how a seemingly simple question can lead to a web of complicated calculations, percentages and adjustments. Even without the leap years and bank holidays. Never a dull moment (or working hour) in HR, is there? 

For small business managers, manually tracking leave for these variations, managing accruals, and ensuring WTR compliance across a mix of full-time, part-time, flexi-time, and even zero-hour contracts is… a lot. Fortunately, Leave Dates can help you automate all of this, so you can put your calculators and spreadsheets away and focus on people instead. 

However, you do it, accurately tracking working hours is crucial because this is the baseline figure that informs all your other calculations, ensuring employees get everything they’re owed (in time and money). The business stays both productive and compliant.