How much annual leave you get in the UAE
Under Article 29 of Federal Decree-Law No. 33 of 2021, a full-time employee in the private sector is entitled to at least 30 calendar days of paid annual leave for each year of service. In the first year the rule is different: once you have completed 6 months, you earn 2 days for each month worked. That gives up to 24 days in the first year. From the second year on, you get the full 30 days. Your contract can give you more, but not less.
How the calculator counts your days
The leave year runs from your joining date, not from January. For the first year the calculator counts your full months of service and gives 2 days for each, but only after you pass 6 months. After the first year it counts the full months since the start of the current leave year and gives 30 days times those months divided by 12, rounded to the nearest half day. Then it adds any days carried over and subtracts the days you have taken. Part months are not counted, so the result is a cautious figure.
What the leave value means
When a job ends, the law says the employee is paid for annual leave days that were earned and not taken, and that payment is worked out on the basic salary. The calculator does the same: basic monthly salary divided by 30, times the leave balance. Pay while you are actually on leave is a different question, explained in the section on what leave salary includes.
Carrying leave forward
You can carry unused leave into the next year if your employer agrees, but the executive regulations and many contracts set a limit. Employers can also schedule when leave is taken, with notice. Do not assume that unused days will be paid every year. Agree any carry-over in writing, and keep your leave approvals so the balance can be checked when you leave.
Who these rules do not cover
This tool is for the UAE private sector under the federal labour law. DIFC and ADGM have their own employment laws. Federal and local government staff follow their own HR laws, and domestic workers are covered by a separate law. Part-time and some flexible contracts use their own leave rules. If any of these applies to you, check the rules for your sector.
What leave salary includes under Decree-Law 33 of 2021
The law uses two different wages. Article 1 defines the basic wage as the wage set in the contract for the work, without any other allowances or in-kind benefits, and the wage as the basic wage plus the cash allowances and in-kind benefits given under the contract or the law. Article 29 then says annual leave is taken with full wage (clause 1) and that the worker is entitled to the wage for the period of the leave (clause 6); it does not say basic wage for leave you actually take. For leave you have not taken when you leave the job, clause 9 is explicit: the unused days, and the share for part of the last year, are paid according to the basic wage. Clause 8 lets a worker carry leave forward or receive a cash allowance for it under company rules and the Implementing Regulation, and clause 10 leaves the detailed rules on leave compensation to that regulation. We read the English text of the Decree-Law published on u.ae, which is marked as not an official translation, on 19 October 2026. We could not open the Implementing Regulation from here, so this page does not describe its details.