How this calculator works
Every Canadian jurisdiction sets vacation pay as a percentage of the gross wages you earned during the relevant 12-month vacation year, and the percentage steps up with years of continuous service: 4% for a 2-week minimum almost everywhere to start, 6% once you cross that jurisdiction's long-service threshold, and — federally only — 8% after 10 completed years. Saskatchewan uses an equivalent fraction of weeks-over-52 instead of a round percentage. Pick your jurisdiction and years of service, enter your gross wages for the vacation year, and the calculator applies the matching rate.
After-tax value = Net pay(wages + vacation pay) − Net pay(wages)
Statutory minimums vs. your actual contract
Every figure here is a legislated floor, not a typical or average outcome. Many employers — especially unionized workplaces, government jobs and senior roles — offer more than the statutory minimum: extra weeks of paid time off, a higher percentage than the law requires, or vacation time on top of the vacation pay itself. A contract or collective agreement can always improve on the statutory minimum; it can never fall short of it. If your own vacation benefit is richer than what this calculator shows, that's your employer choosing to exceed the law, not an error in the math.
What counts as "wages," and why it differs by province
The percentage is the easy part; the wage base it's applied to is where jurisdictions genuinely disagree. Every jurisdiction excludes tips and gratuities from the calculation, and every jurisdiction includes your regular earnings — but beyond that, definitions diverge. Ontario, New Brunswick, Manitoba and Nova Scotia exclude vacation pay you already received this year from the base for next year's calculation, so it doesn't compound. British Columbia, Saskatchewan and Newfoundland and Labrador go the other way and include previously paid vacation pay, which means Saskatchewan's formula effectively compounds on itself year after year. Most jurisdictions include overtime and commissions; a few (like Alberta) explicitly exclude overtime pay from this specific calculation even though it's part of your regular pay. The table further down lists each jurisdiction's own wording, sourced and dated — the note under the wages field above updates with whatever jurisdiction you pick.
Paid on every cheque, or saved for vacation time
Employers have two common ways to actually pay this out. One is to fold vacation pay into every regular paycheque as a separate, identified line — common for casual, seasonal or part-time work where a traditional "vacation" may never happen. The other is to bank it and pay the accumulated amount out shortly before the vacation itself, typically within 7 to 14 days depending on the jurisdiction. Both are legal almost everywhere, provided employees are told which method applies and it's visible on their pay stub rather than silently blended into a base wage. The distinction matters for withholding: CRA calculates tax and CPP/QPP using the regular pay-period method when vacation pay is tied to an actual leave period, but switches to the "bonus or irregular payments" method when it's paid as a lump sum or spread across every cheque with no corresponding time off — EI and QPIP premiums use the regular-salary method either way.
What you're owed when you leave a job
Vacation pay you've earned doesn't evaporate if you resign, get laid off or are terminated. The pattern spelled out explicitly for federally-regulated employees — and mirrored in spirit across the provinces — is that any vacation pay already earned for completed years must be paid out in full, plus a prorated share for whatever part of the current vacation year you actually worked, calculated at the percentage your years of service already qualify for. This calculator doesn't attempt that proration automatically (see "not modelled" above); use it to check the percentage and rate that should apply to your final partial year, then apply it to the wages you actually earned in that stretch.
Worked example — a federally-regulated employee, 6 years, $62,000
A federally-regulated employee (say, a bank or telecom employee) has completed 6 consecutive years with the same employer. Gross wages for the relevant year of employment — regular pay, overtime and commissions, excluding tips — total $62,000. Six years passes the federal 5-year mark, so the rate is 6% for 3 weeks' vacation:
- Vacation pay: $62,000 × 6% = $3,720.00, payable within 14 days before the vacation begins.
- If this employee lives and files taxes in Ontario, adding that $3,720 on top of a $62,000 income nets out to about $2,392.70 after federal and Ontario tax, CPP and EI — a 64.3% keep-rate, because the vacation pay is taxed at the marginal rate on top of the $62,000, not blended into the average rate the way the whole paycheque is.
- All $3,720 is pensionable (CPP), insurable (EI) and taxable income, reported the same as any other pay.
Worked example — Saskatchewan's fractional formula
Saskatchewan is the one jurisdiction that doesn't use a round 4%/6%/8% figure — it pays weeks-of-vacation ÷ 52 weeks in the year, which lands close to, but not exactly on, the percentages everyone else uses. For an employee with less than 10 years' service and $28,000 in wages plus commission for the 12-month period (Saskatchewan's own published example):
- $28,000 × 3/52 = $1,615.38 for 3 weeks' vacation. (Saskatchewan's own guide states this as $1,615.39 — a one-cent difference from independently re-deriving the exact fraction, likely a rounding step in their own worked example.)
- At 10 or more completed years, the rate steps up to 4/52: $28,000 × 4/52 = $2,153.85 — this one matches Saskatchewan's own published figure exactly.
Vacation pay by jurisdiction, all 14, 2026
Every jurisdiction's percentage, minimum time off, and the threshold that separates them — sourced and dated individually, because several of these figures moved or were reconfirmed during 2025 and 2026.
| Jurisdiction | Vacation pay rate | Min. weeks | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Federal (Canada Labour Code) | 4% under 5 yrs · 6% at 5–9 · 8% at 10+ | 2 · 3 · 4 | canada.ca, 12 Dec 2025 |
| Alberta | 4% under 5 yrs · 6% at 5+ | 2 · 3 | alberta.ca, read 5 Sep 2026 |
| British Columbia | 4% under 5 yrs · 6% at 5+ | 2 · 3 | gov.bc.ca, 25 Feb 2022 |
| Manitoba | 4% under 5 yrs · 6% at 5+ | 2 · 3 | gov.mb.ca, read 5 Sep 2026 |
| New Brunswick | 4% under 8 yrs · 6% at 8+ | 2 · 3 | laws.gnb.ca, read 5 Sep 2026 |
| Newfoundland and Labrador | 4% under 15 yrs · 6% at 15+ | 2 · 3 | assembly.nl.ca, read 5 Sep 2026 |
| Northwest Territories | 4% under 6 yrs · 6% at 6+ | 2 · 3 | justice.gov.nt.ca, read 5 Sep 2026 |
| Nova Scotia | 4% through 8 yrs · 6% at 9+ ‡ | 2 · 3 | nslegislature.ca, Jan 2025 |
| Nunavut | 4% under 6 yrs · 6% at 6+ | 2 · 3 | gov.nu.ca, read 5 Sep 2026 |
| Ontario | 4% under 5 yrs · 6% at 5+ | 2 · 3 | ontario.ca, 5 Feb 2026 |
| Prince Edward Island | 4% under 5 yrs · 6% at 5+ † | 2 · 3 | littler.com, 3 Jul 2026 |
| Quebec | 4% under 3 yrs · 6% at 3+ | 2 · 3 | cnesst.gouv.qc.ca, read 5 Sep 2026 |
| Saskatchewan | 5.77% (3/52) under 10 yrs · 7.69% (4/52) at 10+ | 3 · 4 | saskatchewan.ca, read 5 Sep 2026 |
| Yukon | 4% flat — no step-up | 2 | yukon.ca, 2 Dec 2024 |
† Prince Edward Island's Employment Standards Act was replaced in full (Royal Assent 29 Nov 2024, provisions phasing in through 2025–2026). The 5-year threshold shown here is corroborated by two independent professional sources rather than a direct fetch of the Act itself — PEI's own government pages and CanLII both blocked automated access during our research. Treat this one row as medium, not high, confidence until confirmed directly against the Act.
‡ Nova Scotia's Labour Standards Code (s. 32(1)(a) and (c), verified directly against the government's own consolidated text) says both the 3-week time entitlement and the 6% pay rate apply once an employee "has been in the employ of the employer for more than eight years" — worded identically for both, with no split between them. Since "more than eight years" can't be satisfied by exactly 8 completed years, this calculator applies the 6% rate from 9 completed years. Nova Scotia's own plain-language vacation pay guide on novascotia.ca instead describes the pay rate as starting a year earlier ("after completing 7 years") — that page appears to be inconsistent with its own statute; this calculator follows the Act's actual text.
FAQ
Is the percentage in this calculator a legal minimum, or can my employer pay less?
It's a legislated floor, not a starting point your employer can negotiate downward. Every jurisdiction in the table below sets its own minimum vacation percentage and minimum time off by years of service, and an employment contract or company policy can only improve on it — more paid vacation, or a higher percentage of wages — never less. A pay stub showing a lower percentage than your jurisdiction's minimum for your years of service is a labour standards violation, not something you happened to agree to.
What exactly counts as "wages" when calculating vacation pay?
It depends on the jurisdiction, and the differences are real: most provinces include overtime, commissions and non-discretionary bonuses in the wage base and exclude only tips and gratuities, but several go further — Ontario and New Brunswick exclude any vacation pay already paid out that year, British Columbia and Saskatchewan explicitly include it (Saskatchewan's formula compounds on itself as a result), and Newfoundland and Labrador's own statutory definition of "wage" includes vacation and holiday pay outright. This calculator applies your jurisdiction's percentage to whatever gross figure you enter — use the note under the wages field, and the sourced table below, to see what your jurisdiction includes.
Can my employer pay vacation pay on every cheque instead of saving it for when I take time off?
In most jurisdictions, yes — as long as employees are told which method applies and the amount is identifiable in payroll records rather than folded silently into a base wage. The alternative is paying the full amount shortly before the vacation itself (commonly within 7–14 days, depending on the jurisdiction). Either way, CRA treats the two methods differently for withholding: vacation pay tied to an actual leave period is taxed like a regular pay period, while vacation pay paid on every cheque or as a lump sum with no corresponding leave uses the "bonus or irregular payments" method instead — EI premiums are calculated the same way regardless of which method applies.
What happens to unused vacation pay when I leave a job?
You're owed it — employers can't treat unpaid vacation pay as forfeited on resignation, layoff or termination. The common pattern across jurisdictions (spelled out explicitly for federally-regulated employees) is that any vacation pay already earned for completed years must be paid out in full, plus a prorated amount for whatever part of the current vacation year you actually worked, calculated at whatever percentage applied to your years of service. This is separate from any severance or termination pay you might also be owed.
Is vacation pay taxed differently than my regular pay?
No — it's fully taxable employment income, and it's pensionable (CPP/QPP) and insurable (EI/QPIP) the same as any other pay, reported in the same T4 boxes. What can differ is the withholding method: tax and CPP/QPP are calculated using your regular pay-period method if the vacation pay is paid for an actual vacation period, or using CRA's bonus-payment method if it's paid as a lump sum or continuously without you taking the corresponding leave. EI/QPIP premiums use the regular-salary method in every case. This calculator's after-tax figure shows the net effect of adding the vacation pay to your income for the year, not a specific payroll withholding calculation.
This page is general information based on published 2026 federal and provincial labour standards and CRA payroll guidance, not legal, tax or financial advice. Your own employment contract, collective agreement or employer's actual payroll practice may differ — talk to your provincial or federal labour standards office, or a licensed professional, about your specific situation.