The Netherlands's best 2026 leave play: one day off buys four
Book Friday 2 January 2026 off and you turn one day of annual leave into four days off in a row. New Year’s Day falls on a Thursday, so pairing it with that single Friday links straight into the weekend of 3–4 January, giving you 1–4 January off for the cost of one leave day. It is the best leave-to-days-off ratio on the Dutch public holiday calendar for the year: four days off for one day spent.
The year’s best bridge
Here is the play, day by day.
- Thursday 1 January — public holiday (New Year’s Day)
- Friday 2 January — take this as leave
- Saturday 3 January — weekend
- Sunday 4 January — weekend
One leave day, spent on the Friday, connects a Thursday holiday straight through to the weekend. The result is four consecutive days off, and the ratio that matters — days off per leave day used — comes out at 4. Nothing else on the 2026 calendar matches it: the reason this one works is that the holiday lands on a Thursday, leaving only a single working day between it and the weekend.
The bigger block
If you want more than a long weekend, the same New Year period stretches further. Spending four leave days across the turn of the year buys nine consecutive days off, running from Saturday 27 December 2025 to Sunday 4 January 2026.
That block works because it absorbs a weekend on each side of the holiday period as well as the New Year’s Day holiday itself, so four working days of leave cover a nine-day stretch. It is the standard trade at that time of year: fewer people are at their desks between Christmas and New Year regardless, so the leave tends to buy more real disconnection than the same four days would elsewhere in the calendar.
The small print
These plays use nationwide public holidays only, taken from the Nager.Date dataset as of this review. The Netherlands has regional and employer-specific closures too — many workplaces close between Christmas and New Year as a matter of custom rather than public holiday, and any of those only make the plays above stronger, never weaker. Your own leave entitlement is a matter between you and your employer or contract; this page shows only where public holidays make leave days go furthest, not how many days you have to spend.
Run your own budget
Put in your own leave balance and this same New Year window will show you exactly how far it stretches for you.