Annual Leave, Working Hours, and Overtime in Saudi Arabia (2026)
Annual Leave, Working Hours, and Overtime in Saudi Arabia (2026)
Leave, hours, and overtime are the three rules that touch every single payday and every single weekend. Get them right and you stay compliant and your team stays happy. Get them wrong and you create payroll disputes, labor complaints, and avoidable penalties. The 2025 amendments to the Saudi Labor Law, which came into force on 19 February 2025, refreshed several of these rules, so this guide brings the entitlements up to date for 2026 and shows you exactly how to do the math.
Annual Leave: What the Law Guarantees
Annual paid leave is governed by Article 109 of the Labor Law. The entitlement scales with how long a worker has been with the same employer.
- A worker is entitled to no less than 21 days of paid annual leave per year.
- The entitlement rises to no less than 30 days after the worker completes five continuous years of service with the same employer.
Two points are easy to miss. First, these are minimums, not fixed ceilings. An employer can offer more, and many do as a retention tool, but it can never offer less. Second, the way leave is counted matters. The standard employment contract template on the Qiwa platform refers to working days when calculating leave entitlements, reflecting the MHRSD interpretation. Note that the core Article 109 entitlement itself was not changed by the 2025 amendments; what changed around it was the contract framework and other leave categories.
Practical reminders
- Confirm whether your contract counts leave in working days or calendar days, because the Qiwa unified contract template points to working days.
- Track the five-year service milestone carefully, because that is the trigger that moves an employee from the 21-day floor to the 30-day floor.
Working Hours: The Daily and Weekly Limits
The headline standard sits in Article 98: a worker may not actually work more than 8 hours per day or more than 48 hours per week. That is the normal-time ceiling, and it is the baseline every roster should be built around.
The 11-hour total cap
There is a second, separate limit that governs the longest a single day can run once overtime is added. Total actual working hours, including overtime, may not exceed 11 hours in a single day. In practice that means up to 3 hours of overtime can sit on top of the 8-hour standard day.
An important citation detail: this 11-hour cap lives in the Implementing Regulations, not in Article 98 itself. Article 98 only sets the 8-hour daily and 48-hour weekly standard. If you are drafting policy or responding to a dispute, attribute the 11-hour figure to the Implementing Regulations to avoid a citation error.
Ramadan hours
During Ramadan, actual working hours for Muslim employees are reduced to a maximum of 6 hours per day or 36 hours per week, with no reduction in pay. The Muslim-employee qualifier is load-bearing here; the statutory reduction applies to them specifically.
Overtime: How to Calculate It Correctly
Overtime is where payroll errors creep in most often, so it is worth slowing down on the formula.
The premium
Under Article 107, overtime must be paid at the worker's hourly wage plus 50% of the basic wage. In other words, overtime is paid at 150% of the basic hourly rate, a 1.5x multiplier.
The hourly rate divisor
To apply the multiplier you first need the hourly rate, and this is the step that trips people up. In Saudi Arabia the hourly rate is calculated by dividing the basic monthly salary by 240 hours. That 240 comes from the standard monthly working-hour basis used in the Kingdom: 8 hours multiplied by roughly 30 days. Some draft guides circulate a 208-hour divisor, which is incorrect for Saudi Arabia. Use 240.
Worked example
| Step | Calculation | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Basic monthly salary | Given | SAR 9,600 |
| Hourly rate | 9,600 / 240 | SAR 40 / hour |
| Overtime rate | 40 x 1.5 | SAR 60 / hour |
So for this employee, every overtime hour is worth SAR 60.
Compensatory leave instead of overtime pay
The 2025 amendments introduced a flexible alternative. With the employee's written consent, an employer may grant compensatory paid leave instead of overtime pay, at a rate of 1.5 hours of leave per overtime hour. The conditions are specific:
- The leave must be granted within 60 days of the overtime being worked.
- Accrual is capped at 30 days per year.
- Any unused balance is paid out on termination.
This gives both sides room to choose between cash and time off, but it only works with documented written consent.
Leave Categories Touched by the 2025 Amendments
While annual leave under Article 109 was left unchanged, several other leave categories were updated. These are worth knowing because they sit alongside annual leave in any modern leave policy.
| Leave type | Entitlement | Detail |
|---|---|---|
| Maternity | 12 weeks full pay | Extended from 10 weeks under Article 151. Six weeks are mandatory immediately after delivery; the remaining six are flexible and may start up to 4 weeks before the expected delivery date. Full pay applies after one year of service; half pay if less. |
| Paternity | 3 days | Must be taken within 7 days following the child's birth. The 2025 amendment clarified this previously unspecified window. |
| Bereavement (sibling) | 3 days paid | New in 2025. Previously only the death of ascendants or descendants was covered; the death of a sibling now qualifies. |
The maternity nuance is important for accurate planning: the full-pay 12 weeks applies to employees with at least one year of service, while those with less than a year receive half pay.
Frequently Asked Questions
How many days of annual leave am I entitled to in Saudi Arabia?
You are entitled to no less than 21 days of paid annual leave per year. After five continuous years of service with the same employer, that rises to no less than 30 days per year, under Article 109. These are minimums, so your contract may grant more but never less.
What is the maximum number of hours I can be required to work in a day?
The normal standard is 8 hours per day and 48 hours per week under Article 98. Once overtime is added, total actual working hours may not exceed 11 hours in a single day, a cap that comes from the Implementing Regulations. During Ramadan, Muslim employees work a maximum of 6 hours per day or 36 hours per week with no cut in pay.
How is overtime pay calculated in Saudi Arabia?
Overtime is paid at 150% of the basic hourly rate under Article 107 (hourly wage plus 50% of the basic wage). To find the hourly rate, divide the basic monthly salary by 240 hours. For example, SAR 9,600 divided by 240 equals SAR 40 per hour, and multiplied by 1.5 gives SAR 60 per overtime hour.
Can my employer give me time off instead of overtime pay?
Yes, since the 2025 amendments, but only with your written consent. The employer may grant compensatory paid leave at 1.5 hours of leave per overtime hour, granted within 60 days of the overtime, capped at 30 days of accrual per year, with any unused balance paid out when employment ends.
Build Your Leave and Overtime Policy on Solid Ground
Annual leave, working hours, and overtime are connected systems. A wrong divisor on overtime or a misattributed legal article can quietly turn into a payroll dispute months later. If you are reviewing employment terms, it helps to read these rules alongside the broader reforms in the 2025 Saudi Labor Law overview and the updated maternity and paternity leave rules for 2026.
Have a specific scenario, like a Ramadan roster, a mixed cash-and-leave overtime arrangement, or a five-year leave milestone? Ask the Saudi HR assistant. It answers questions on Saudi labor law in plain Arabic or English, grounded in the current rules, so you can check an entitlement or run an overtime calculation in seconds.