Annual Leave in France: 25 Days + RTT Explained

France's Leave System at a Glance

France's statutory annual leave is among the most generous in the world. Under Article L3141-3 of the Code du travail, every salaried employee is entitled to 2.5 working days of paid leave (conges payes) for each month of effective work, capped at 30 jours ouvrables per year. Most companies count leave in jours ouvres (Mon-Fri), which is the equivalent of 25 working days, or 5 full weeks. This applies regardless of your contract type, whether you are on a CDI (permanent contract), CDD (fixed-term contract), or even a temporary agency assignment.

But statutory leave is only the first layer. France's distinctive working-time framework adds two more: RTT days and public holidays.

RTT (Reduction du Temps de Travail) days are additional rest days granted to employees who work more than the legal 35-hour week. For many cadres (professional-grade employees) and those on flexible working arrangements, RTT adds 10 to 12 extra days per year. Not everyone receives them, but for those who do, the impact on total time off is substantial.

On top of conges payes and RTT, France observes 11 public holidays (jours feries) per year. Only one of them, 1 May (Fete du Travail), is legally guaranteed as a paid day off for all workers. The other 10 are customarily observed but technically depend on your employer or the applicable collective agreement (convention collective).

Add these layers together and the total potential paid days off for a French worker ranges from 36 to 48 days per year, before counting weekends.

France counts leave in working days (jours ouvrables or jours ouvres), not calendar days. Under the jours ouvres system used by most companies, Saturdays are excluded from the count. This means your 25 days of conges payes cover exactly five Monday-to-Friday weeks.

For a broader comparison of how France stacks up internationally, see our leave policy cheat sheet by country.

How Do Conges Payes Work?

The French leave system runs on its own calendar. Unlike most countries where entitlements reset on 1 January, France's conges payes accrue over a reference period (periode de reference) that runs from 1 June to 31 May of the following year (Service-Public.fr). Leave earned during this window becomes available for use in the subsequent holiday year. Some sectors, notably construction and entertainment, use a different reference period (1 April to 31 March) set by their convention collective.

A 2024 reform (loi du 22 avril 2024) brought French law into line with EU rules by allowing employees to continue accruing paid leave during periods of non-occupational sick leave (arret maladie). This is a separate change from how the reference period works, which still runs June to May.

The summer obligation

French law imposes a specific requirement on how you take your main annual leave. The legal holiday period runs from 1 May to 31 October (Article L3141-13). When the main leave (conge principal) exceeds 12 working days, at least one fraction of 12 consecutive working days must be taken between two weekly rest periods within the legal holiday period (Articles L3141-18 and L3141-19). It reflects a deeply held French principle that workers need a substantial unbroken rest period, not just scattered long weekends.

The maximum continuous leave you can take in one stretch is 24 working days (Article L3141-17), unless you can demonstrate exceptional family circumstances such as a spouse working in a different region or a dependent with a disability. Because of this 24-day cap, the days beyond it (the cinquieme semaine, or fifth week) are taken separately from the main block.

Employer scheduling and accrual

Employers have significant authority over when leave is taken. They must establish a leave schedule (ordre des departs) after consulting the works council (comite social et economique, or CSE), and they can designate company-wide closure periods. Many French companies still shut down for two to three weeks in August. The employer must give at least one month's notice before imposing specific leave dates.

New employees begin accruing leave from their first day of work at 2.5 days per month. Part-time workers receive a proportional entitlement based on their working days per week, not hours per day.

What Are RTT Days and Who Gets Them?

RTT days are a product of France's 35-hour workweek legislation: the Aubry laws of 1998 (Aubry I, voluntary transition) and January 2000 (Aubry II, mandatory for firms with more than 20 employees). The concept is straightforward: if your contract requires you to work more than 35 hours per week, the excess hours are typically compensated through additional rest days rather than overtime pay.

How RTT is calculated

The calculation compares actual annual working hours against the 35-hour legal threshold. A worker averaging 39 hours per week accumulates roughly 4 extra hours each week. Over a year, these additional hours translate into approximately 22 to 23 days of RTT, though in practice most companies cap the entitlement at 10 to 12 days through collective agreements.

For workers on forfait-jours (fixed-day) contracts, the calculation is different. A forfait-jours contract defines working time in days rather than hours, capped by Article L3121-64 at 218 days per year (the journee de solidarite is included). The standard working year contains roughly 228 working days after removing weekends, public holidays, and conges payes. The difference gives these workers approximately 10 RTT days, though the exact figure varies year to year with the calendar.

Who receives RTT

RTT days are not universal. They apply primarily to:

Cadres and professionals on forfait-jours contracts, the most common arrangement for managers and senior professionals. These workers do not track hours and are exempt from the 35-hour rule. Instead, they receive whatever number of rest days is needed to bring their annual working days down to the agreed total of 218.

Non-cadre employees whose contractual hours exceed 35 per week. If your contract specifies 37, 38, or 39 hours, RTT compensates for the surplus. These workers typically receive 10 to 12 RTT days, though the number can be higher depending on the gap.

Workers paid at or near the minimum wage (SMIC), part-time employees working 35 hours or fewer, and those in sectors that never fully adopted the 35-hour framework typically do not receive RTT.

Employer vs. employee RTT

In most companies, RTT days are split between employer-directed days (jours de RTT employeur) and employee-choice days (jours de RTT salarie). A common arrangement is a 50/50 split. The employer can designate their share to align with periods of low business activity, such as bridge days around public holidays or the week between Christmas and New Year. The employee can use their share freely, subject to normal scheduling constraints.

RTT days that are not taken by the end of the calendar year are typically lost. Unlike conges payes, there is no automatic carry-over right for RTT. Some companies allow you to place unused RTT into a compte epargne temps (time savings account), but this is not mandatory. Check your company's policy before December to avoid losing days.

What Are the Public Holidays in France for 2026?

France observes 11 public holidays (jours feries) each year. Unlike in some countries where holidays float to the nearest Monday, French public holidays are fixed dates, which means they can fall on any day of the week. When a public holiday lands on a Tuesday or Thursday, it creates a natural opportunity for a pont (bridge day), where employees take the adjacent Monday or Friday off to create a four-day weekend.

The spring of 2026 is exceptionally strong for French workers. Easter Monday, Labour Day, Victory Day, Ascension, and Whit Monday all fall between early April and late May. The May cluster is remarkable: Labour Day on a Friday (1 May), Victory Day on a Friday (8 May), Ascension on a Thursday (14 May), and Whit Monday (25 May) mean that with just 4 leave days you can build four separate long weekends in a single month. Bastille Day on a Tuesday is a classic pont setup where one day of leave yields a four-day break.

The autumn is weaker. Assumption falls on a Saturday and All Saints' Day on a Sunday, delivering no additional weekday time off. Armistice Day on a Wednesday creates a jour isole, an isolated midweek holiday that requires leave on both sides to create a meaningful break.

Only 1 May (Fete du Travail) is legally guaranteed as a paid, non-working day for all employees (Article L3133-4). For the other 10 holidays, your entitlement depends on your collective agreement and employer policy. In practice, the vast majority of French employers observe all 11, but confirm with your HR department, particularly for Lundi de Pentecote, which some companies designate as the journee de solidarite (solidarity day) requiring employees to work an additional unpaid day to fund support for elderly and disabled persons.

For a detailed explanation of bridge-day strategy across different countries, see our guide on how holiday bridges work.

How Does the Fractionnement Bonus Work?

The fractionnement (splitting) bonus is one of the lesser-known features of French leave law, and one that rewards strategic planning. It works like this: if you take a portion of your main annual leave outside the legal summer period (1 May to 31 October), you earn extra leave days as compensation. The rules are codified in Article L3141-23 of the Code du travail.

The rules are precise:

• If you take 3 to 5 days of your conge principal outside the May-October window, you earn 1 additional day.
• If you take 6 or more days outside the summer window, you earn 2 additional days.

The bonus is calculated on the conge principal only and excludes any days of leave granted beyond the 24th (so the fifth week does not count toward the threshold). The mandatory 12-day continuous block must remain within the May-October period regardless. The bonus is granted by default under the Code du travail, but Article L3141-23 explicitly allows collective agreements or individual employee waivers to set different rules, which is why many employers ask staff to renounce the bonus in writing when leave dates are negotiated.

The strategic angle

For leave optimisers, fractionnement creates a clear incentive to save some conges payes for the winter months. Taking a week off in November or February not only gives you a break during a period with fewer public holidays, it also earns you 1 to 2 bonus days that you can deploy elsewhere in the year.

Consider the Armistice Day bridge in November 2026. The 11th falls on a Wednesday. Taking Thursday and Friday off with 2 leave days gives you a 5-day break. Those 2 days count toward your fractionnement threshold, and if combined with other winter leave, they contribute to earning the bonus.

Many collective agreements modify or replace the default fractionnement rules. Some waive the bonus entirely, while others enhance it. Check your convention collective before counting on the extra days.

A French worker who combines the fractionnement bonus with strategic bridge-day placement can effectively turn 25 statutory days into 27 and stretch them across 40 or more actual days off work. In 2026, the combination of spring bridges and winter fractionnement leave makes this particularly achievable.

How Does France Compare to Other Countries?

France's total leave package is among the strongest in the world when you combine statutory leave, RTT, and public holidays. Here is how it stacks up against other major economies.

Several patterns emerge. France's statutory floor of 25 days already exceeds what most countries guarantee, and the RTT mechanism pushes the practical total beyond any comparable economy. Germany comes closest when you factor in collective agreements and state-level public holidays, but even a Bavarian worker typically reaches around 43 days, while a French cadre with full RTT can approach 48.

The United Kingdom's 28-day headline figure is misleading because it includes bank holidays. Strip those out and British workers have 20 discretionary days, five fewer than the French statutory minimum. Japan offers 16 public holidays but notoriously low utilisation rates mean far fewer actual days off. The United States remains the only advanced economy with no federal mandate for paid vacation.

For a full comparison across more countries, see our leave policy cheat sheet by country. We also publish country-specific annual leave guides for 2026 covering optimised booking strategies for each nation.

Making the Most of France's Leave System

France gives its workers one of the most comprehensive leave packages anywhere. Between 25 statutory days of conges payes, up to 12 RTT days, 11 public holidays, and the fractionnement bonus, the raw materials for a well-structured year of breaks are abundant.

But quantity alone does not guarantee quality. The placement of your leave days matters as much as the count. A single pont after Ascension Thursday creates a four-day weekend for one day of leave. The April-to-May corridor in 2026 offers an extraordinary density of public holidays that, with careful planning, can turn a handful of conges payes into weeks of continuous time off. And the fractionnement rules actively reward you for distributing leave across the year rather than burning everything in August.

Understanding how conges payes, RTT, and public holidays interact is the first step. The second is running your specific situation through an optimizer that accounts for your remaining leave balance, your company's RTT policy, and the 2026 calendar.

Try the free optimizer at leavewise.co

Disclaimer

This article summarizes French employment-law (Code du travail) frameworks as of May 2026. The Code is amended frequently; conventions collectives (collective bargaining agreements) often grant additional rights. Use this article as a starting point, not legal advice. Verify against Légifrance Code du travail, Service-Public.fr, or a qualified avocat en droit du travail.