Working Days Calculator
Count the Monday-to-Friday working days between two dates, inclusive, minus any holidays you list.
Updated Formula covered by automated tests
Set a start and end date and the calculator counts the Monday-to-Friday days between them, counting both the first and last date. Paste in any holidays your organization observes and those are removed too, with weekend holidays ignored so nothing is subtracted twice.
The count is useful for payroll and contractor invoices billed per working day, for sizing a leave request against an allowance, for service-level agreements that promise a response "within 10 business days", and for HR questions such as how many working days fall in a notice period. A finance team might use it each month to know how many trading days the books cover.
The formula
- T
- Total calendar days in the range, both ends included
- N(date)
- Serial day number of a date
- ⌊T ÷ 7⌋
- Number of complete weeks in the range; every complete week holds exactly five weekdays
- H
- Number of distinct listed holidays that fall on a weekday inside the range
Any run of seven consecutive dates contains exactly five weekdays and two weekend days, whatever day it starts on. So the count splits into full weeks, which contribute five each, and a leftover of zero to six days whose weekdays are checked one by one from the weekday of the start date. This is the same idea behind spreadsheet functions like NETWORKDAYS.
Holidays are subtracted only when they land on a weekday inside the range. When a fixed-date holiday falls on a weekend, US federal practice moves the day off to the Friday before or the Monday after; if your employer does that, list the observed date (for example July 3, 2026, since July 4 is a Saturday) rather than the calendar date.
Worked example
A US payroll clerk needs the number of paid working days in October 2026 for a daily-rate contractor. The company observes Columbus Day, Monday, October 12.
- 1 Total days: October 1 to October 31 inclusive is 31 days, starting on a Thursday.
- 2 Full weeks: ⌊31 ÷ 7⌋ = 4, giving 4 × 5 = 20 weekdays.
- 3 Leftover 31 − 28 = 3 days: Thursday 29, Friday 30 and Saturday 31, of which 2 are weekdays, so 22 weekdays in total.
- 4 Subtract the holiday: October 12 is a Monday inside the range, so 22 − 1 = 21.
- 5 Weekend days: 31 − 22 = 9 (four full weekends plus Saturday the 31st).
Result: October 2026 has 21 paid working days for this contractor: 22 weekdays minus the Columbus Day holiday.
Before you rely on the result
- Weekends are fixed as Saturday and Sunday, and half-days or shift work are not modeled.
- Holidays must be entered as YYYY-MM-DD dates; the tool does not know any holiday calendar on its own.
Frequently asked questions
Does the count include the start and end dates?
Yes, both are included, so a single Monday gives 1 and Monday to Friday of the same week gives 5. If you need the working days strictly between two dates, subtract the endpoints that are weekdays.
Which holidays should I enter?
Only the ones your employer or contract actually gives off. US federal agencies observe 11 public holidays, including Juneteenth since 2021, but private employers choose their own list, and states and other countries differ. The OPM page in the sources lists federal dates for each year.
My week runs Sunday to Thursday. Can I use this?
Not directly; the calculator assumes Saturday and Sunday are the weekend. For a Sunday-to-Thursday week (common in parts of the Middle East) or a six-day week, the full-week shortcut changes to the number of working days per week, so count the leftover days by hand.
Why does my bank count a different number of business days?
Banks follow the Federal Reserve holiday calendar, which includes some days a private employer may not close (such as Columbus Day and Veterans Day), and a payment deadline that falls on a closed day usually rolls to the next business day.