A good PTO accrual rate gives you at least 10 to 15 days off per year, which translates to an hourly accrual between 0.038 and 0.058 for a standard 40-hour workweek. Where you fall in that range depends on your experience level, your industry, and how your employer structures time off. Understanding the math behind accrual rates helps you evaluate a job offer, compare benefits packages, or figure out whether your current plan is competitive.
National Averages by Years of Service
The Bureau of Labor Statistics tracks how much vacation time employers provide at different tenure milestones. As of March 2025, private industry workers receive an average of 11 vacation days after one year of service, 15 days after five years, 18 days after ten years, and 20 days after twenty years. State and local government workers get slightly more at every level, ranging from 13 days after one year up to 22 days after twenty years.
These numbers represent vacation days specifically and don’t always include sick time. Many employers now bundle vacation, sick days, and personal days into a single PTO bank. If your employer uses a combined PTO plan, the total number of days should be higher than the vacation-only averages above, since it’s replacing what used to be two or three separate buckets of leave.
As a rough benchmark: if you’re in your first few years at a company and accruing 10 to 12 PTO days annually, you’re in line with national norms. If you’re accruing 15 or more days within your first five years, your plan is above average for private industry.
How PTO Accrual Math Works
Most employers express accrual as a number of hours earned per hour worked, per pay period, or per month. The formula is straightforward: divide your total annual PTO hours by the total hours you work in a year. For a full-time employee working 40 hours a week, that’s 2,080 work hours per year.
For 10 days (80 hours) of annual PTO, the hourly accrual rate is 0.038. That means for every hour you work, you bank about 0.038 hours of PTO, which adds up to roughly 1.5 hours per week. For 15 days (120 hours) of annual PTO, the rate jumps to 0.058 per hour worked, giving you about 2.3 hours per week. And for 20 days (160 hours), the rate is approximately 0.077 per hour.
If your employer pays biweekly (26 pay periods per year), you can also think about it per paycheck. At a 15-day plan, you’d accrue about 4.6 hours of PTO each pay period. At a 10-day plan, that drops to about 3.1 hours per paycheck. These numbers help you project how much time off you’ll have banked by a specific date, which is useful when planning a trip months in advance.
What “Good” Looks Like at Different Career Stages
For entry-level or early-career workers, accruing 10 to 15 days annually is standard and competitive. That’s an hourly rate between 0.038 and 0.058. Anything above 15 days at this stage puts you ahead of the curve, especially in private industry.
Mid-career professionals with five to ten years of experience should look for 15 to 20 days, corresponding to hourly rates of 0.058 to 0.077. Many employers use tiered accrual schedules that automatically increase your rate at service anniversaries, so check whether your plan includes these bumps and when they kick in.
Senior employees with 15 or more years of tenure typically accrue 20 or more days. At 25 days (200 hours), the hourly rate reaches about 0.096. Some generous employers cap out at 25 to 30 days for long-tenured staff, though plans offering more than 25 days are relatively uncommon outside of government roles.
Accrual Plans vs. Other PTO Structures
About 61% of employers use accrual plans tied to your hire date, where you gradually earn PTO throughout the year. Another 14% use calendar-year accrual, resetting your balance each January. Front-loaded plans, used by about 17% of employers, give you your full PTO balance at the start of the year or on your anniversary date rather than making you earn it incrementally.
Unlimited PTO has gotten a lot of attention but remains uncommon. Only about 7% to 9% of employers offer it. Under these plans, there’s no accrual rate at all. You request time off as needed with manager approval. In practice, employees at companies with unlimited PTO often take fewer days than those with a set accrual, partly because there’s no defined entitlement and partly because of workplace pressure.
If you’re comparing a job offer with unlimited PTO against one with a defined accrual, pay attention to company culture and how much time people actually take. A 20-day accrual plan where you’re encouraged to use every day can be more valuable than an unlimited plan where the norm is 10 days.
Accrual Caps and Rollover Policies
Your accrual rate only tells part of the story. Many employers set a cap on how many hours you can bank at any one time. Once you hit that cap, you stop accruing until you use some PTO. A typical cap is 1.5 times your annual accrual, so if you earn 120 hours per year, your balance might max out at 180 hours. This creates a “use it or lose it” pressure that varies by employer.
Rollover policies matter too. Some companies let you carry unused PTO into the next year indefinitely, others cap rollover at a set number of days, and some require you to use all your PTO within the calendar year or forfeit it. When evaluating a PTO plan, look at the accrual rate together with the rollover and cap rules. A high accrual rate with a tight cap and no rollover can leave you with less usable time off than a moderate rate with generous rollover.
It’s also worth knowing that many states require employers to pay out accrued but unused PTO when you leave a job, whether you quit or are terminated. Some states mandate this automatically, while others only require it if the employer doesn’t have a written policy stating otherwise. This makes your accrued PTO balance a form of earned compensation in those states, which is another reason the accrual rate has real financial weight.
Evaluating a PTO Offer
When you’re reviewing a benefits package, convert the accrual rate into annual days so you can compare plans on equal footing. Multiply the hourly accrual rate by 2,080 to get your total annual PTO hours, then divide by 8 for the number of days. An offer listing a 0.058 hourly accrual rate is giving you 15 days per year. An offer listing 4.62 hours per biweekly pay period works out to the same 15 days.
Also check whether paid holidays are included in the PTO bank or provided separately. An employer offering 10 PTO days plus 10 paid holidays is giving you 20 days of paid time away from work. An employer offering 15 PTO days with holidays rolled in might actually give you less flexibility, since you’d need to use PTO for Thanksgiving and the Fourth of July. The total package, not just the accrual rate, determines how much time off you actually get.