Quick answer
The best-known four day work week statistics come from organized trials where companies kept pay at 100% and cut hours. In the UK pilot of June to December 2022, 56 of 61 companies (92%) kept the four-day week. In the US, a June 2022 Gallup survey found 8% of full-time employees work four days a week.
Four day work week statistics fall into three groups: trial results from companies that tested a shorter week, national surveys of how many people already work four days, and polls of what workers want. The headline trial number is from the UK pilot: 92% of the 61 participating companies continued the four-day week after six months, and 71% of employees reported lower burnout, according to the Autonomy report of February 2023. One caveat applies to every trial figure on this page. The companies volunteered, and most were small office-based firms, so the results describe employers who wanted it to work.
How many Americans work a four-day week
No federal survey counts four-day or compressed workweeks directly. The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) release Job Flexibilities and Work Schedules, 2024-2025, published September 24, 2026, does not report compressed schedules. It does show which days people usually work, which is the closest federal proxy.
- 8% of US full-time employees said they work four days a week in June 2022, up from 5% in 2020. 84% worked five days and 8% worked six. The sample was 12,313 full-time employees. (Gallup)
- Gallup asked about days, not hours. Its 8% therefore mixes 32-hour weeks with compressed 40-hour schedules such as the 4/10 work schedule.
- 68% of wage and salary workers usually worked Monday through Friday in 2024-2025, and 8% usually worked Saturday and Sunday. (BLS)
- Among full-time workers, 85.9% usually worked on Fridays, compared with 87.5% to 88.9% on Monday through Thursday. Workzenly calculation: Friday is about 2.4 percentage points below the Monday to Thursday average. (BLS Table 9)
- The Friday gap is wider in production occupations: 77.3% usually worked Fridays, versus 87.6% to 88.4% on other weekdays. Workzenly calculation: about 10.9 points lower, consistent with four-day shift patterns in plants, though BLS does not say why.
- 8.4% of full-time workers said their days of work vary, and 57% of all wage and salary workers had a flexible schedule that let them vary start and end times. (BLS)
What this means for employers: Four-day schedules are still a small minority in the US, and most of what exists is compressed 40-hour weeks rather than 32-hour weeks. If you are weighing one, compare the two common models first: our guides to the 4/10 schedule and the 9/80 schedule cover how each handles overtime and coverage.
Four-day week trial results: companies
The two largest published company trials were coordinated by the nonprofit 4 Day Week Global in 2022. Companies agreed to keep pay at 100% and make a meaningful cut in hours, after a two-month preparation period. Researchers at Boston College, University College Dublin and the University of Cambridge collected the data. These are self-selected samples with no control group for the company metrics.
| Measure | US and Ireland trial (2022) | UK pilot (Jun-Dec 2022) |
|---|---|---|
| Companies / employees | 33 / 903 | 61 / about 2,900 |
| Companies continuing after trial | 18 of 27 definitely; 7 planning to | 56 of 61 (92%); 18 made it permanent |
| Revenue, trial start to end (size-weighted) | +8.14% (16 companies) | +1.4% (23 companies) |
| Revenue vs same period a year earlier | +37.55% (20 companies) | +34.5% (24 companies) |
| Resignations per 100 employees | 1.76 to 1.70 | 2.0 to 0.8 |
| Sick and personal days per employee per month | 0.56 to 0.39 | 2.0 to 0.7 |
| Company rating of the trial (0-10) | 9.0 | 8.3 |
Source: 4 Day Week Global, The Four Day Week: Assessing Global Trials of Reduced Work Time with No Reduction in Pay (2022); Autonomy, The Results Are In: The UK's Four-Day Week Pilot (February 2023).
- The UK report's headline 35% revenue figure compares the trial period with a similar period in earlier years; its table gives 34.5%. The start-to-end change during the trial was 1.4%.
- UK resignations fell 57% and sick and personal days fell 65%, but the researchers say they "are unable to say that these three trends are statistically significant," citing small numbers. The same caveat applies to the US and Ireland figures.
- Of the 5 UK companies that did not continue, 2 extended their trials and 3 paused the four-day week.
- 70 UK companies originally signed up; 9 did not start, most often because they felt unprepared.
- Staff counts held steady: down 1.3% in the UK (34 companies) and up 12.16% in the US and Ireland trial (18 companies).
Who joined: In the UK, marketing and advertising firms were the largest group (18%), then professional services (16%) and charities (11%), and 66% had 25 or fewer employees. In the US and Ireland trial, 36% were admin, IT and telecoms firms, 27% professional services, and 52% had 10 or fewer employees. In that trial, health care and retail had one company each.
What this means for employers: The trials show that small knowledge-work firms that prepare carefully can cut hours without a measurable revenue drop. They say little about restaurants, clinics or warehouses, where output is tied to hours on the floor. Treat the numbers as a ceiling for a well-run pilot, not a forecast.
Burnout and well-being results
Employee results are where the trials found their largest and statistically significant changes. Both reports compare the same employees' survey answers at the start and end of the six-month trial.
- UK burnout: 71% of employees had lower burnout scores at the end, and 22% had higher scores.
- UK stress: 39% were less stressed, 13% more stressed and 48% saw no change.
- UK health: 43% reported better mental health versus 16% worse; 37% reported better physical health versus 18% worse.
- UK life satisfaction rose from 6.69 to 7.56 out of 10, and satisfaction with time from 5.28 to 7.51.
- US and Ireland burnout: 67% reported lower burnout and 20% higher. The burnout score fell from 2.74 to 2.30.
- US and Ireland life satisfaction rose from 6.64 to 7.53 out of 10. The share sleeping fewer than 7 hours fell from 41.3% to 35.1%, a figure the researchers say should be read with caution.
What this means for employers: Burnout is the outcome that moved most consistently. If turnover or sick days are your problem, a pilot may be worth measuring against those costs. Our burnout statistics and employee engagement statistics show the national baseline you would be comparing against.
Hours actually worked in four-day week trials
A four-day week in a trial did not always mean 32 hours. Companies chose their own model, and some staff still worked on the day off.
- UK average hours fell from 38 to 34 a week. Days worked fell from 4.86 to 4.52.
- 71% of UK employees reported fewer hours, 15% worked more and 13% saw no change. 34% reported less overtime; 49% saw no change in overtime.
- US and Ireland average hours fell from 40.83 to 34.83, and days worked from 5.00 to 4.36.
- In the US and Ireland trial, 47% of companies gave Friday off, 25% had no common day off, and 12% cut daily hours instead of a full day.
- In the UK, 32% of responding companies (14 of 44) gave everyone Friday off and 25% had no common day off. In 12 of 44 companies, some staff, usually part-time workers, kept their existing hours.
What this means for employers: Staggered days off were common because customers still call on Fridays. That makes the schedule, not the policy memo, the hard part. A 32-hour week also differs from a compressed week under US law: a 4/10 plan still totals 40 hours, while daily-overtime states such as California treat 10-hour days differently. See California overtime law and how many hours is full time before changing contracts or benefits eligibility.
Peer-reviewed evidence on the four-day week
The strongest study so far is "Work time reduction via a 4-day workweek finds improvements in workers' well-being" by Wen Fan, Juliet B. Schor, Orla Kelly and Guolin Gu, published in Nature Human Behaviour on July 21, 2025. The same researchers led the quantitative work on both pilot reports above.
- The study covers 2,896 employees at 141 organizations in six countries: Australia, Canada, Ireland, New Zealand, the UK and the US.
- After a 6-month trial with no pay cut, it found "improvements in burnout, job satisfaction, mental health and physical health," a pattern "not observed in 12 control companies."
- Both company-wide and individual cuts in hours were linked to well-being gains, but only larger individual cuts were linked to larger improvements.
- Better self-reported work ability, fewer sleep problems and less fatigue explained part of the effect.
Gallup's national data point the other way on one measure. In June 2022, US full-time employees on four-day schedules had higher burnout than five-day employees, and their wellbeing was no longer significantly higher, though they had the lowest active disengagement (Gallup). The difference is method: Gallup compared existing schedules, including compressed 10-hour days, while the trials cut hours with no pay change.
What this means for employers: The evidence supports cutting hours, not squeezing the same hours into fewer days. If your plan is a compressed 40-hour week, the trial well-being results may not apply.
What workers want: four-day work week statistics from surveys
- 77% of US workers said a four-day, 40-hour week would have an extremely or somewhat positive effect on their wellbeing; 20% expected no real effect and 3% a negative effect. The Bentley-Gallup survey ran May 8-15, 2023 with 5,458 adults. (Gallup)
- Support fell with age, from 82% of workers aged 18 to 29 to 69% of those 60 and older.
- The four-day week ranked above mental health days (74% positive) and limits on work outside hours (73%) in the same survey.
- At the end of the UK pilot, 96% of employees preferred a four-day week and 90% said they definitely wanted to continue. In the US and Ireland trial, 97% wanted to continue.
What this means for employers: Once employees have a four-day week, taking it away is costly: 52% of UK participants who preferred it would want a raise of more than 25% to go back, or would not go back at any price (Workzenly calculation: 29% + 8% + 15%). Decide how you will end a pilot before you start one. For other flexibility options workers value, see our remote work statistics and hybrid work schedule guide.
Four-day workweek legislation
No US law requires a four-day or 32-hour week. Under the Fair Labor Standards Act, overtime still starts after 40 hours in a workweek (see overtime statistics and overtime laws by state).
- H.R. 1332, the Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act, was introduced March 1, 2023 by Rep. Mark Takano and referred to the House Committee on Education and the Workforce. (govinfo)
- S. 3947, the Senate version, was introduced March 14, 2024 by Sen. Bernard Sanders and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions. (govinfo)
- Both would amend the FLSA to cut the standard workweek from 40 to 32 hours. Govinfo lists only the introduced text of each bill, and we could not confirm a version in the current 119th Congress on an official site.
What this means for employers: A four-day week is a voluntary policy today. You set the hours, the pay and which roles qualify, and you still owe overtime to non-exempt staff past 40 hours. This is general information, not legal advice.
About this data
These four-day work week statistics come from six sources. The BLS Job Flexibilities and Work Schedules release is based on an American Time Use Survey module and is published every few years; the 2024-2025 figures average 12 months of 2024 and 11 months of 2025, because the survey was suspended from October 1 to November 12, 2025. Gallup's schedule data is from June 2022 and its attitude survey from May 2023; Gallup has not published a newer schedule count we could find. The UK and US-Ireland pilot reports are one-time studies of volunteer companies, with self-reported company metrics. The Nature Human Behaviour paper is peer reviewed and includes control companies.
Trial percentages describe change within the same employees from start to end, not a comparison with similar firms. Where we compute a gap or sum, the text says "Workzenly calculation." We review this page when new releases come out. Journalists, students and bloggers are welcome to cite it with a link to this page.
More workforce statistics: Average work week hours · Burnout statistics · Remote work statistics · Labor productivity statistics.
Sources
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Job Flexibilities and Work Schedules, 2024-2025 (USDL-26-1533), released September 24, 2026. bls.gov/news.release/flex2.nr0.htm
- U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Table 9, Variability of weekly work hours and percent working by day of week, 2024-2025 averages. bls.gov/news.release/flex2.t09.htm
- Gallup, Is the 4 Day Work Week a Good Idea?, Jim Harter, updated November 3, 2023 (data from June 2022). gallup.com/workplace/354596
- Gallup, American Workers Optimistic About Impact of Wellness Initiatives, Tara Nicola, November 7, 2023 (Bentley-Gallup survey, May 8-15, 2023). gallup.com/workplace/513923
- Autonomy, The Results Are In: The UK's Four-Day Week Pilot, February 2023. autonomy.work/portfolio/uk4dwpilotresults
- Schor, Fan, Kelly, Gu et al., The Four Day Week: Assessing Global Trials of Reduced Work Time with No Reduction in Pay, 4 Day Week Global, 2022. 4dayweek.com/us-ireland-results
- Fan, W., Schor, J.B., Kelly, O. and Gu, G., Work time reduction via a 4-day workweek finds improvements in workers' well-being, Nature Human Behaviour 9, 2153-2168, published July 21, 2025. nature.com/articles/s41562-025-02259-6
- U.S. Government Publishing Office, H.R. 1332, Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act, introduced March 1, 2023. govinfo.gov/app/details/BILLS-118hr1332ih
- U.S. Government Publishing Office, S. 3947, Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act, introduced March 14, 2024. govinfo.gov/app/details/BILLS-118s3947is
Frequently asked questions
How many Americans work a four-day week?
In a June 2022 Gallup survey of 12,313 full-time US employees, 8% said they work four days a week, up from 5% in 2020. Another 84% worked five days and 8% worked six. Gallup counted days, not hours, so the 8% can include compressed 40-hour weeks as well as 32-hour weeks.
What did four-day week trials find?
In the UK pilot of 61 companies and about 2,900 workers (June to December 2022), 56 companies (92%) kept the four-day week and 71% of employees reported lower burnout, according to the Autonomy report of February 2023. Companies chose to join, so results may not hold for every employer.
Does a four-day work week reduce burnout?
A peer-reviewed study in Nature Human Behaviour (July 21, 2025) of 2,896 employees at 141 organizations in six countries found improvements in burnout, job satisfaction, mental health and physical health after a six-month four-day week trial. The pattern was not seen in 12 control companies. Employees whose hours fell the most improved the most.
Did revenue fall during four-day week trials?
Not on average. In the UK pilot, revenue rose 1.4% from start to end of the trial across 23 companies, weighted by size. In the 2022 US and Ireland trial, revenue rose 8.14% across 16 companies. Both figures are self-reported by firms that volunteered, and neither study used a control group for revenue.
Is there a federal four-day work week law?
No. The Thirty-Two Hour Workweek Act, which would amend the Fair Labor Standards Act to cut the standard workweek from 40 to 32 hours, was introduced as H.R. 1332 on March 1, 2023 and S. 3947 on March 14, 2024. Govinfo lists only the introduced text of each, and the FLSA overtime threshold remains 40 hours.
How many US workers want a four-day week?
In the Bentley-Gallup survey of May 8-15, 2023, 77% of US workers said a four-day, 40-hour week would have an extremely or somewhat positive effect on their wellbeing, 20% expected no real effect and 3% expected a negative one. Support was 82% among workers aged 18 to 29 and 69% among those 60 and older.