Business Days Guide: Count Workdays Between Dates (And Add N Business Days)

What are business days?

Business days (workdays) usually mean Monday–Friday, excluding weekends and sometimes holidays.

Unlike calendar days, business days are not universal: weekend definitions and holiday calendars vary across regions and organizations.

For accurate planning (banking, shipping, payroll), confirm which holidays and weekend rules apply.

Counting business days between dates

Counting business days answers “how many working days are in this window?”

Two common gotchas: whether the start/end dates are included, and whether holidays should be excluded.

If a range includes weekends, business-day counts can be much smaller than calendar-day counts.

If you need holiday-aware results, either enter holiday dates (best) or use a simple holiday-count estimate when you only know “about X holidays apply”.

Adding N business days

Adding business days is used for deadlines (“+5 working days”) and operational SLAs.

When you add N business days, you skip weekends (and optionally holidays). This is different from adding N calendar days.

If your deadline is based on a specific holiday calendar, enter holiday dates. If you only have a rough holiday count, you can use the estimate mode—useful for quick planning but not legal/contract accuracy.