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PTO accrual calculator

Enter your policy to see what you bank each payday and for every hour worked, where the balance stands today, what an accrual cap is quietly costing you, and what the unused time is worth in cash.

You are paid

Used for the per-hour-worked rate. Part-time hours bank PTO faster per hour on the same annual grant.

Where your balance is now
$
Balance now
60.0 hrs7.5 days off
Each payday
4.62 hrs
Per hour worked
0.0577 hrs
Accrued over 13 paydays60.00 hrs
Taken0.00 hrs
A full year at this policy120 hrs (15.0 days)
1 PTO hour per17.3 hrs worked

Whether a balance gets paid out when you leave depends on your state and your employer's written policy, not on federal law.

Paid time off is not required by federal law, per the U.S. Department of Labor, so everything here describes your employer's policy rather than an entitlement. See all free tools

The formula

How PTO accrual is calculated

Put the policy in hours, then divide by how often you are paid. A grant of 15 days at 8 hours is 120 hours a year, so on a fortnightly cycle you bank 4.62 hours every payday and 10 hours a month. Employers who accrue per hour worked instead reach the same annual figure on a full-time schedule, but the balance grows slower in a light week and faster in a heavy one.

The number nobody puts on a payslip is the exchange rate. On that same policy you bank 1 hour of PTO for roughly every 17.3 hours on the clock, so a full day off costs about 139 hours of work. That is the figure worth carrying into a conversation about whether the package is competitive.

Three things the payslip leaves out
The rate

Two ways to earn it

A fixed annual grant split across paydays, or a rate per hour worked. Both reach the same total on a full-time schedule; only one moves when your hours do.

The ceiling

A cap quietly stops accrual

Hit the ceiling and you stop banking until you take time off. Hours you would have earned are never granted, which is different from losing a balance you already have.

The value

The balance is money

Unused time has a cash value at your hourly rate. Whether it gets paid out when you leave depends on your state and your handbook, so it is worth knowing the number early.

What you bank each payday

Find your policy in the first column and read across to your pay cycle. The annual total never changes; the pay cycle only decides how it arrives, which is why a monthly payroll makes a balance look like it is filling faster when it is not.

PTO policyHours a yearWeeklyEvery 2 weeksTwice a monthMonthly
10 days80 hrs1.54 hrs3.08 hrs3.33 hrs6.67 hrs
12 days96 hrs1.85 hrs3.69 hrs4.00 hrs8.00 hrs
15 days120 hrs2.31 hrs4.62 hrs5.00 hrs10.00 hrs
18 days144 hrs2.77 hrs5.54 hrs6.00 hrs12.00 hrs
20 days160 hrs3.08 hrs6.15 hrs6.67 hrs13.33 hrs
25 days200 hrs3.85 hrs7.69 hrs8.33 hrs16.67 hrs
30 days240 hrs4.62 hrs9.23 hrs10.00 hrs20.00 hrs

PTO accrual based on hours worked

Hourly and part-time staff are usually given an accrual rate per hour instead of a flat annual grant. The middle column is that rate; the last two are the version that actually tells you something, which is how long you work to earn an hour and a day off. Figures assume a 40-hour week.

PTO policyPTO earned per hour workedHours worked per 1 PTO hourHours worked per full PTO day
10 days0.0385 hrs26.0 hrs208 hrs
12 days0.0462 hrs21.7 hrs173 hrs
15 days0.0577 hrs17.3 hrs139 hrs
18 days0.0692 hrs14.4 hrs116 hrs
20 days0.0769 hrs13.0 hrs104 hrs
25 days0.0962 hrs10.4 hrs83 hrs
30 days0.1154 hrs8.7 hrs69 hrs

What unused PTO is worth

A banked balance is deferred pay, and seeing it as a number changes how people treat it. Forty hours at $30 is $1,200 sitting on the books.

Whether you are paid that when you leave is decided by your state and your employer's written policy, not by federal law. Some states treat accrued vacation as earned wages that must be paid out; others let a written forfeit-on-exit policy stand. Check your state labor department before you count on it, and check it before you hand in notice rather than after.

Balance$18.00/hr$22.00/hr$25.00/hr$30.00/hr$40.00/hr$55.00/hr
8 hrs (1.0 days)$144$176$200$240$320$440
16 hrs (2.0 days)$288$352$400$480$640$880
24 hrs (3.0 days)$432$528$600$720$960$1,320
40 hrs (5.0 days)$720$880$1,000$1,200$1,600$2,200
80 hrs (10.0 days)$1,440$1,760$2,000$2,400$3,200$4,400
120 hrs (15.0 days)$2,160$2,640$3,000$3,600$4,800$6,600

Is paid time off required by law?

Not federally. The Department of Labor puts it plainly: the Fair Labor Standards Act does not require payment for time not worked, including vacations, sick leave and holidays, and describes these as matters of agreement between an employer and an employee. A number of states and cities do mandate paid sick leave, which is a separate question from vacation.

That is why the handbook is the document that matters here, and why two people doing identical work at different employers can bank time at completely different rates. If the policy looks thin next to what your role commands elsewhere, the benefit is part of the package: our free salary benchmark puts the cash half against government wage data for your state.

When the time off is the only part you want

There is a version of this where the balance is the only thing keeping the job tolerable, and the arithmetic quietly says so: counting paydays until you can be somewhere else is a signal worth reading. If the hours are the problem rather than the days off, the overtime pay calculator checks whether the long weeks are at least being paid correctly, the commute cost calculator adds the hours the journey takes on top, and beating burnout without quitting covers what changes before an exit does.

Frequently asked questions

What people ask once they have the number.

Divide the annual grant by the number of times you are paid. A policy of 15 days at 8 hours is 120 hours a year, so on a fortnightly cycle you bank 4.62 hours each payday and 10 hours a month. Some employers accrue per hour worked instead, which comes to the same annual total for a full-time schedule but pays you less in a light week and more in a heavy one.

No, not under federal law. The Department of Labor states plainly that the Fair Labor Standards Act "does not require payment for time not worked, such as vacations, sick leave or federal or other holidays", and that these benefits "are matters of agreement between an employer and an employee". Some states and cities do require paid sick leave specifically, which is a separate question from vacation. Whatever you have, the terms come from your handbook or contract rather than from federal law.

Divide the annual grant by the hours you work in a year. On 15 days a year at a 40-hour week, that is 120 hours of PTO across 2080 hours worked, so you bank 1 hour of PTO for roughly every 17.3 hours on the clock, and a full day off for about every 139 hours worked.

It depends which method your employer uses, and the difference matters. Under a per-hour-worked policy a half-time schedule banks half the hours, which most people expect. Under a fixed annual grant split across pay periods, a part-timer banks the same hours as a full-timer, which is unusual but does happen. Check which method your handbook describes before assuming.

A ceiling on how much you can have banked at once. When you hit it, accrual stops until you take time off and drop back below the line, so hours you would have earned are simply never granted. It is different from a use-it-or-lose-it rule, which zeroes a balance on a set date. The calculator shows what a cap costs you over the period, because that number is usually larger than people expect.

A policy where unused PTO expires at the end of the year rather than carrying forward. Some states restrict or prohibit it on the grounds that accrued vacation is earned wages; others allow it. Because the answer turns entirely on where you work, check your state labor department rather than assuming either way.

That is decided by state law and your employer's policy, not by federal law. Several states treat accrued vacation as earned wages that must be paid out at separation; others leave it to the written policy, in which case a policy that says unused time is forfeited will usually stand. Work out what the balance is worth first, then check your state labor department, because it is a number worth knowing before you hand in notice.

Divide by the length of your working day. Most policies assume 8 hours, so 120 hours is 15 days. If you work 10-hour shifts, the same balance is fewer days off, which is why compressed schedules can quietly shrink the value of a grant stated in hours.

Generally no. Overtime is owed on hours actually worked in the week, so a week with 32 worked hours and 8 hours of PTO usually totals 40 for pay but does not trigger a premium, because only 32 were worked. Our overtime pay calculator works the week itself out if you need the exact figure.

PTO usually means a single pool covering everything, so you draw on the same balance whether you are ill or on holiday. Separate vacation and sick banks keep them apart, which can be better if your state mandates paid sick leave, since those protected hours stay ringfenced instead of being spent on a holiday. The accrual maths is identical either way; only the labelling and the rules on carryover and payout differ.

Only if your employer allows advancing time you have not yet earned, which some do for new starters. Where it is allowed, the handbook usually says the advance is recovered from your final pay if you leave before earning it back. This calculator does not model a negative balance, because it is the exception rather than how accrual normally runs.

It computes standard accrual arithmetic, which is what almost every policy uses underneath. What varies is the inputs: the annual grant, the accrual method, the cap, the waiting period for new starters, and whether the year runs on the calendar or your hire date. Take the numbers from your handbook, put them in, and the maths will follow.

Sources

Twenty days a year is five percent of your life spent recovering from the other ninety-five.

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For information and inspiration only. This tool is not financial, tax, legal, or career advice, and MyPassion.AI accepts no liability for decisions made using it. Every figure and template is an estimate that can differ from your circumstances, so confirm anything important with an employment lawyer or your state labor department before you act. Use of this tool and its content is subject to our Terms of Service.