SA Leave & Holiday Planner
Count working days and estimate remaining leave. Plan leave around South African public holidays.
Make something useful.
Enter the details, review your result, then copy or export. No account and no AI required.
See a real task before you start
Calculate a December leave request using the selected work schedule.
Plan your leave
Count leave days and South African public holidays.
Keep this work for next time
Guests can keep using this tool. Members can save and resume drafts across devices, with no AI required.
Save or export a complete editable draft, including repeated line items. Files and passwords are never included. JSON backups stay on your device unless you choose to share them.
Your result
See the output and use its export controls when ready.
Complete the form to get started.
Quality checkpoint
- Check applicable public holidays and contracts
- Approve leave based on company policy
The calculator, builder or download above works independently. AI Assist is an optional explanation and writing helper, never required to complete the core task.
Calculate leave days and plan around South African public holidays
A five-day worker and a six-day worker may use a different number of working days for exactly the same calendar holiday. Public holidays can change the calculation again. The Basic Conditions of Employment Act generally provides for at least 21 consecutive days of annual leave per annual leave cycle, usually equivalent to 15 working days for a standard five-day week. Our planner counts scheduled working days between your dates, excludes selected South African public holidays, and makes the assumptions visible. It is a planning worksheet, not payroll approval or a substitute for an employment contract.
Before you start
Leave planning needs a defined workweek, a selected date range and the correct public-holiday calendar. Employment contracts and sectoral rules can change accrual or treatment, so keep calculated days separate from policy decisions.
How to use this tool
- Select your requested leave start and end dates. Choose a Monday-Friday or Monday-Saturday working week.
- Review recognised South African public holidays in the chosen period and add any special or organisation-specific closure dates that apply.
- Enter your current available leave balance to calculate the balance after the proposed trip. Export a leave-request calendar file or a concise CSV breakdown.
A real-world example
A standard Monday-Friday employee requests leave between 7 and 11 December, with no intervening public holiday. The request uses five working days. If a recognised public holiday falls on an ordinary work day during leave, it does not count as annual leave.
The built-in holiday calendar covers 2026 and 2027 and includes the specially declared 4 November 2026 election-day holiday. Verify future declarations and your employer’s policy before approval.
Check this before you finish
- Confirm the employee’s ordinary working days.
- Check statutory holidays and their observed dates.
- Compare the result with the actual leave balance and agreement.
What to avoid
A simple planner does not determine every employment-law exception or payroll consequence.
WHAT THIS TOOL ACTUALLY DOESCalculate working/leave days under stated assumptions.
Frequently asked questions
Does everyone receive 15 days a year?
No. The legislation describes 21 consecutive days per leave cycle, with other agreed accrual methods; actual scheduled work days and contract provisions affect the working-day equivalent.
Can my employer count public holidays as annual leave?
Generally, a public holiday falling on an ordinary working day during annual leave does not use an annual-leave day. Check applicable employment provisions.
Official sources and further reading
Requirements and policies change. Check the original organisations before making filing, legal or payroll decisions.
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