Annual leave in Sweden: 25 days, semesterlön and saving vacation days (semesterlagen in English)

Under Sweden's Annual Leave Act (semesterlagen, SFS 1977:480), every employee is entitled to 25 days of annual leave each holiday year, and unless something else is agreed, at least four of those weeks should fall together in June–August. Pay for those days (semesterlön) is either your normal salary plus a 0.43% supplement per day (sammalöneregeln) or 12% of what you earned in the earning year (procentregeln), and days above 20 paid days can be saved for up to five years.

Here is how each rule works as of 2026, for employers and expats alike.

How many days of annual leave do you get in Sweden?

Section 4 of the Act is direct: "En arbetstagare har rätt till tjugofem semesterdagar varje semesterår", or an employee has the right to 25 holiday days every holiday year. Collective agreements and employment contracts often give more, but the statute sets the floor.

Leave is counted in whole days (section 3 a). Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays generally do not use up holiday days, so 25 days works out to five working weeks.

Term	What it means
Semesterår (holiday year)	1 April to 31 March the following year, as defined in section 3
Intjänandeår (earning year)	The equivalent period immediately before the holiday year
Semesterdagar	The 25 days of leave each holiday year
Semesterlön	Holiday pay for paid holiday days
Semesterersättning	Payment for earned holiday pay when employment ends
Sparade dagar	Saved days carried to a later holiday year

The split between earning year and holiday year matters: the right to leave is 25 days every year, but whether those days are paid depends on what you earned in the earning year before.

Are all 25 days paid in your first year?

Not necessarily. Section 7 calculates paid days in proportion to how much of the earning year you were employed. Days of unpaid full absence are subtracted, but certain leave (such as absence that counts toward holiday pay, see below) is kept in. The result is divided by the number of days in the earning year, multiplied by 25 and rounded up to the nearest whole number.

So someone who joined halfway through the earning year will typically have around 13 paid days and the rest unpaid. Section 8 lets the employee waive holiday days that carry no holiday pay. They can take them as unpaid leave or not take them at all.

Starting late in the year. If employment begins after 31 August in a holiday year, section 4 limits the leave entitlement for that holiday year to five days.

Short contracts. For employment meant to last no more than three months, section 5 allows the parties to agree that no holiday leave will be scheduled. The employee then receives semesterersättning (holiday compensation) instead.

Do you have a right to four weeks off in the summer?

Yes, by default. Section 12 says leave is scheduled, unless otherwise agreed, so that the employee gets a period of at least four weeks during June–August. The employer can depart from this only for special reasons (särskilda skäl).

For employers, this is why Swedish summer planning starts early: if most of the team is entitled to four weeks between June and August, cover has to be planned across the whole summer, not just the weeks around midsummer. See our shared team leave calendar guide.

How is semesterlön calculated?

The Act has two methods.

Rule	Who it applies to	How it works
Sammalöneregeln (same-salary rule, section 16 a)	Default for employees on fixed weekly or monthly pay	Normal salary continues, plus a supplement per paid holiday day of 0.43% of monthly salary (1.82% of weekly salary for weekly-paid staff)
Procentregeln (percentage rule, section 16 b)	Other employees, cases listed in section 16, or where the employer chooses it	12% of the employee's pay earned during the earning year

Under section 16, the same-salary rule is the default for fixed weekly or monthly pay unless the employer chooses the percentage rule or one of the listed exceptions applies, for example variable pay of at least ten percent. If a monthly-paid employee also earns variable pay, section 16 a adds 12% of the total variable pay that fell due during the holiday year.

Worked example (same-salary rule). An employee earns SEK 40,000 a month and takes 5 paid holiday days. They keep their normal SEK 40,000 salary and receive a supplement of 0.43% × 40,000 = SEK 172 per day, so SEK 860 in total.

Does sick leave or parental leave reduce holiday pay?

Some absence counts as "holiday-pay qualifying" (semesterlönegrundande), which means it is treated as if the employee had worked:

• Sickness: counts if the absence during the earning year does not exceed 180 days, or without that limit if it is due to a work injury (section 17).
• Parental leave: counts up to 120 days in the earning year, or 180 days for a single parent (section 17 a).

Absence beyond those limits reduces the number of paid holiday days for the following year.

Can you save vacation days in Sweden?

Yes. Under section 18, an employee who has more than 20 paid holiday days in a holiday year may save one or more of the surplus days to a later holiday year. With the statutory 25 days, that means up to five days a year.

The rules around saved days (sparade dagar):

• Five-year limit. A saved day must be taken within five years from the end of the holiday year in which it was saved. Section 20 lets the parties agree to use them in year six if using them in year five would cause significant inconvenience.
• No saving while using saved days. You cannot save days in a holiday year in which you take saved days from earlier years.
• Notice. The employee chooses the holiday year in which to take saved days (section 20), and if they want saved days taken separately, they must tell the employer at least two months in advance (section 19).
• Pay. Saved days are paid under the same holiday pay rules and are treated as earned in the most recent earning year (section 22), so they are paid at the current rate.

Tracking these balances by holiday year is where spreadsheets usually break. See our guide to carry-over and leave accrual for the general mechanics.

What happens to unused holiday when you leave the job?

If employment ends before the employee has received the holiday pay they earned, section 28 says they receive semesterersättning instead. If holiday pay was paid in advance (for example, paid days taken before they were fully earned), section 29 a lets the employer deduct it from the final compensation. This does not apply if the advance was paid more than five years earlier, or if employment ended because of illness or certain dismissals not related to the employee personally.

Tracking Swedish leave in Absenca

If you run a Swedish office alongside others, Absenca lets each office keep its own leave year, work week, public holidays and leave types, so a Stockholm office can run an April–March year with 25 days while another office uses the calendar year. Balances, accrual and carry-over are included on the free plan for up to 10 people. Absenca tracks days and balances but does not calculate semesterlön, which stays with payroll.

FAQ

Is it 25 working days or 25 calendar days?

25 holiday days (semesterdagar). Saturdays, Sundays and public holidays generally do not count as holiday days, so 25 days is five working weeks for a Monday–Friday worker.

Can my employer refuse my four weeks of summer holiday?

Only with an agreement or special reasons. Section 12 makes at least four weeks in June–August the default.

How many vacation days can I save per year in Sweden?

Any paid days above 20 in a holiday year, so up to five days a year on the statutory 25 days. Each saved day must be used within five years of the end of the holiday year in which it was saved.

I started in October. How much leave do I get?

If employment begins after 31 August in a holiday year, your leave entitlement for that holiday year is five days. Paid days depend on how long you worked in the earning year.

Is semesterlön 12%?

12% applies under the percentage rule. Monthly-paid staff usually fall under the same-salary rule: normal pay plus 0.43% of monthly salary per holiday day.

For other countries, see our paid leave by country overview and the guide to annual leave in the Netherlands.

Rules can change and collective agreements often differ from the statute; check the current text of semesterlagen (SFS 1977:480) on riksdagen.se.