Learn the main rules on working hours in Turkey, including the 45-hour weekly limit, the 11-hour daily cap, balancing periods, shift systems, night work restrictions, break rules, and employer compliance risks under Turkish labor law.
Working Hours in Turkey
Working hours in Turkey are governed primarily by Labor Law No. 4857, especially Articles 63, 64, 66, 67, 68, 69, 71, 73, and 76, together with special regulations for shift work and night work. For both employers and employees, these rules matter because disputes in Turkish labor law frequently begin with questions such as how weekly hours are distributed, whether a shift plan is lawful, whether night work exceeded legal limits, whether breaks were counted correctly, and whether long-hour schedules were documented properly.
The legal structure is more detailed than a simple “45 hours per week” rule. Turkish law distinguishes between normal weekly working time, balancing periods, compensatory work, breaks, time counted as working time, rotating shift systems, and special limits for night work. It also creates separate restrictions for young workers, underground work, and women working night shifts under specific regulations.
This article explains the main framework of working hours in Turkey, focusing on legal limits, shift systems, and night work rules in a practical and SEO-friendly format. It is designed for employers, HR professionals, foreign investors, and employees who need a clear overview of how Turkish labor law regulates scheduling and working time.
1. The general weekly working time rule
The starting point under Article 63 of Labor Law No. 4857 is that general working time in Turkey may not exceed 45 hours per week. If the parties have not agreed otherwise, those 45 hours are distributed equally across the working days of the week. This is the central baseline of Turkish working-time law and the point from which many later issues, including overtime and shift planning, are assessed.
The same article also allows the weekly working time to be distributed differently across the days of the week, but only on condition that the employee does not work more than 11 hours in a single day. This daily limit is one of the most important rules in practice. Even where a weekly plan appears lawful, a shift schedule may still be unlawful if individual days exceed the statutory ceiling.
For underground mine work, the law imposes a stricter regime. Article 63 states that working time for underground mine workers may not exceed 7.5 hours per day and 37.5 hours per week. This is a special protective rule and means that working-hour analysis in underground mining begins from a lower threshold than in ordinary workplaces.
2. Daily limits matter as much as weekly limits
One of the most common mistakes in practice is to focus only on the weekly total. Turkish labor law does not permit employers to ignore daily workload intensity simply because the monthly or weekly arithmetic later balances out. Article 63 expressly ties flexible distribution of weekly hours to the condition that daily work may not exceed 11 hours. The Ministry’s current 2026 working-hours handbook also summarizes the rule in the same way, stating that, as a rule, daily working time may not exceed 11 hours and night work may not exceed 7.5 hours.
This daily limit has immediate consequences for scheduling models. A workplace that runs compressed schedules, long retail days, irregular logistics shifts, or alternating weekday patterns must still respect the daily ceiling. Turkish law therefore treats working-time compliance as a matter of both quantity and distribution.
3. Balancing periods under Turkish labor law
Turkish law allows a flexible distribution mechanism known as balancing. Under Article 63, the parties may agree that weekly normal working time will be distributed differently across the workweek, as long as the employee’s average weekly working time does not exceed the normal weekly limit within the balancing period. The standard balancing period is two months, and collective bargaining agreements may extend it to four months. In the tourism sector, the law allows balancing within four months, and collective bargaining agreements may extend that to six months.
This rule matters because some intense weeks may not automatically produce overtime liability if balancing has been lawfully established and the employee’s average weekly working time remains within the legal limit during the balancing period. But the balancing system is not unlimited flexibility. The 11-hour daily cap still applies, and the balancing arrangement must fit the legal structure. The Ministry’s handbook also states that a written agreement between employer and employee is required for balancing.
In practice, balancing is one of the most misunderstood parts of Turkish working-time law. Employers sometimes rely on it informally without documenting it properly, while employees sometimes assume every week above 45 hours automatically creates overtime. The legal answer depends on whether the balancing regime was validly established and whether the statutory limits were still respected.
4. Compensatory work is not the same as overtime
Article 64 regulates compensatory work. Where work has been significantly reduced or stopped for compulsory reasons, where the workplace is closed before or after national holidays or general holidays, or where the employee is given leave upon request, the employer may require compensatory work within four months. The law also states that compensatory work may not exceed three hours per day, may not push daily work beyond the legal daily maximum, and may not be required on holiday days. Most importantly, compensatory work is not treated as overtime or extra-hour work.
This distinction is important in real employment practice. Turkish law does allow employers to recover some lost time, but it does so through a controlled mechanism. An employer cannot simply label any additional work “compensatory” and avoid overtime obligations. The legal conditions and time limits of Article 64 must actually be satisfied.
5. What counts as working time?
Article 66 identifies several periods that are counted as working time even if the employee is not continuously performing active labor. These include, among other things, time spent travelling when the employee is sent by the employer to work elsewhere, time spent waiting ready for work, time spent being occupied elsewhere by the employer instead of performing the main task, nursing breaks for women employees, and travel time where workers must be collectively transported to remote job sites such as road, railway, bridge, or similar works. On the other hand, purely social transport provided by the employer to and from the workplace is not counted as working time.
This rule is critical in disputes about working hours in Turkey because the real legal question is often not “How long was the employee physically away from home?” but “Which periods legally count as working time?” Turkish labor law answers that question through Article 66, and the answer can materially affect overtime, scheduling compliance, and payroll calculation.
6. Start and end times must be announced
Article 67 states that daily start and end times, together with break periods, must be announced to employees in the workplace. The Ministry’s 2026 handbook adds that employers must also document employees’ working hours through appropriate means and that, where overtime or extra-hour work is performed, the employer must prepare a record showing those hours and keep a signed copy in the employee’s personnel file.
This is not a minor administrative detail. In Turkish labor disputes, working-time claims often turn on documents. If the employer fails to announce schedules clearly or to keep reliable working-time records, later litigation over overtime, night work, or shift rotation becomes much harder to defend. For employees, the same documentation rules matter because proper records can make the difference between a provable claim and an uncertain one.
7. Break rules in Turkey
Article 68 regulates rest breaks. Employees must receive at least 15 minutes if the work lasts four hours or less, 30 minutes if it lasts more than four hours and up to 7.5 hours, and 1 hour if it lasts more than 7.5 hours. The law states that these are minimum periods, that they are normally granted continuously, though in some cases they may be split by contract depending on climate, season, local custom, and the nature of the work, and that they may be given at the same or different times for different workers. Most importantly, breaks do not count as working time.
The fact that breaks are excluded from working time is essential for correct calculation of daily and weekly hours. A worker’s physical presence in the workplace is not automatically identical to working time under Turkish labor law. Employers should therefore calculate schedules and overtime on the basis of legally counted work, not merely presence. Employees should also understand that a claimed working period must usually be reduced by lawful rest breaks unless the break was not actually available in practice.
8. Shift systems in Turkey
Shift work in Turkey is regulated not only by the Labor Law itself but also by the Regulation on Special Procedures and Principles for Work Carried Out by Employing Workers in Shifts. That regulation applies to workplaces that, by their nature, operate continuously and therefore use consecutive shifts or rotating shift systems. It requires employers to organize and announce the number of shifts, each shift’s start and end times, break periods, weekly rest days, and the names of workers assigned to shifts in a way employees can easily see.
For workplaces operating continuously over a 24-hour cycle, the general rule is that the number of shifts must be organized so that there are at least three worker shifts in 24 hours. However, the regulation allows a two-shift system in certain sectors, including tourism, private security, and health services, including work carried out by subcontractors within those workplaces.
The regulation also protects workers against hidden wage reductions caused by shift restructuring. It states that if an employer increases the number of shifts, or if a three-shift workplace sets daily working time below 7.5 hours because of the shift model, employee wages may not be reduced merely because the daily working time has decreased under the new lawful structure.
9. Rotation between day and night shifts
Article 69 of the Labor Law and the shift-work regulation both address shift rotation. In night-and-day operations using rotating shifts, workers who are assigned to the night shift for one workweek must generally be moved to the day shift in the following workweek. The law also allows a two-week rotation system in day and night shifts. The regulation adds that, unless necessary, workers’ shifts should not be changed arbitrarily, and that a worker whose health is shown by medical report to have deteriorated because of night work should, where possible, be assigned to suitable day work.
This rule shows that Turkish labor law treats shift design as a health-and-safety issue as well as a scheduling issue. A lawful shift system is not simply one that covers the business’s operating hours. It must also respect rotation rules intended to reduce the physical strain of repeated night work.
10. Minimum rest between shifts
The shift-work regulation states that workers may not be employed in another shift without being given at least 11 consecutive hours of rest between shift changes. Article 69 of the Labor Law repeats the same principle for workers whose shifts are changed. The Ministry’s 2026 handbook also summarizes that in shift-based work the employee should have at least 11 hours of rest at shift change.
This is one of the clearest working-time protections in Turkish law. Even where weekly hours are lawful, a shift pattern can still violate the law if workers are moved between shifts too quickly. In practice, this is highly relevant in factories, healthcare facilities, hotels, security operations, and logistics environments where rotating schedules are common.
11. Night work rules in Turkey
Article 69 defines night in working life as the period beginning no later than 20:00 and ending no earlier than 06:00, and in any case a period of no more than 11 hours. The same article states that workers’ night work may not exceed 7.5 hours. This is one of the central night-work rules in Turkey.
There are, however, statutory exceptions. Article 69 allows work above 7.5 hours at night, subject to the worker’s written consent, in tourism, private security, health services, and petroleum exploration, search, and drilling activities under the Turkish Petroleum Law. The shift-work regulation reflects the same sector-based exceptions for tourism, private security, and health services in shift-based night work.
The shift-work regulation also states that if more than half of a shift falls within the night period, that shift is treated as night work. This matters because employers cannot avoid night-work rules simply by labeling a shift as “evening” if the majority of the working time falls into the statutory night period.
12. Young workers and night work
Turkish law protects younger workers more strictly in relation to night work. The shift-work regulation states that workers under 18 years of age may not be employed in shifts falling within the 20:00–06:00 night period. Article 73 of the Labor Law separately prohibits children and young workers under 18 from working at night in industrial work.
This means the legal analysis of night work must always take the worker’s age into account. Even if a general shift plan looks compliant for adults, it may be unlawful if it includes under-18 workers in prohibited night periods.
13. Women working night shifts
Turkey also has a separate regulation on the conditions for employing women employees in night shifts. That regulation applies to women employees over 18 working in workplaces covered by occupational health and safety legislation. It states that, as a rule, women employees may not be employed for more than 7.5 hours in night shifts, subject to the same sectoral exceptions for tourism, private security, and health services where written consent exists.
The same regulation imposes additional obligations on employers. In workplaces outside municipal boundaries, and in workplaces within municipal boundaries where public transport is difficult at shift-change times, employers must provide suitable transport for women employees working night shifts to and from the point closest to their residence. It also requires a health report before assigning women employees to night work and periodic health examinations during employment.
The regulation further protects pregnancy and nursing. It states that pregnant employees, from the time pregnancy is medically established until birth, and nursing employees for one year after childbirth, may not be employed in night shifts. That period may be extended by six more months if medically necessary for the health of the mother or child.
These rules are practically significant because they show that Turkish labor law treats some aspects of night work not merely as a scheduling matter but as a health, transport, and workplace-safety issue. Employers using women employees in rotating or fixed night shifts must therefore comply with more than the general 7.5-hour night limit.
14. Weekly rest in shift work
For workplaces operating with shifts, the shift-work regulation requires that employees receive at least 24 hours of weekly rest on one day of the week, on a rotating basis if necessary. The Ministry’s 2026 working-hours handbook similarly states that weekly rest is uninterrupted and must be at least 24 hours.
This matters because shift systems often run continuously and can create the false impression that weekly rest is more flexible than ordinary scheduling. Under Turkish law, even in rotating-shift operations, weekly rest remains a protected entitlement.
15. Overtime interaction with working-hour rules
Although this article focuses on working hours, shift systems, and night work, overtime remains closely connected. The Ministry’s working-hours handbook explains that work above 45 hours per week is treated as overtime, while work above a contractually set weekly limit below 45 hours and up to 45 hours is treated as extra-hour work. The same handbook and the 2026 penalties schedule show that employers face separate sanctions if they fail to pay overtime, fail to give compensatory time within six months, or fail to obtain employee consent for overtime.
This connection matters because unlawful scheduling often generates both working-time violations and wage violations at once. A night shift above 7.5 hours, a rota that ignores shift-change rest, or a schedule that regularly pushes workers above weekly limits may create overlapping exposure under different provisions of Turkish labor law.
16. Administrative penalties in 2026
The Ministry of Labour’s 2026 administrative fines schedule shows that violations of working-time rules can trigger significant sanctions. For 2026, the schedule lists an administrative fine of TRY 26,620 for failing to comply with Article 63 and the related working-time regulations, TRY 26,620 for failing to implement rest breaks under Article 68, and TRY 26,620 for making employees work more than 7.5 hours at night or failing to rotate night and day shifts in accordance with Article 69.
The same 2026 schedule also lists a fine of TRY 4,815 per affected employee for failing to pay overtime wages, failing to grant the free time due within six months, or failing to obtain the employee’s consent for overtime under Article 41. This shows that Turkish authorities treat working-time breaches as a serious compliance issue rather than as a private payroll disagreement only.
17. Why this topic creates frequent labor disputes
Working hours in Turkey are a major source of conflict because the law regulates more than total weekly time. It regulates start and end times, breaks, time counted as work, balancing periods, compensatory work, shift numbers, shift rotation, rest between shifts, weekly rest, night-work limits, and category-specific protections. A workplace may think it is compliant because workers are paid monthly salaries, but still face legal exposure if the schedule itself violates Turkish labor law.
For employees, the same complexity means that a long-hours complaint is rarely just about “too much work.” It may involve whether time was properly recorded, whether breaks were really given, whether a shift counted as night work, whether a balancing system was valid, and whether the employee belonged to a protected category such as a young worker, a pregnant employee, or an employee in underground work.
Conclusion
The law on working hours in Turkey is built around a clear protective structure: a general 45-hour weekly limit, a general 11-hour daily cap, defined break rules, controlled balancing periods, legally structured shift systems, and strict night-work protections, especially the general 7.5-hour night-work limit and the rotation and rest requirements applicable in shift-based operations.
For employers, the safest approach is to treat working-time compliance as a design issue, not just a payroll issue. Schedules should be built around Article 63, shift plans should comply with the shift-work regulation, night assignments should be checked against Article 69 and the women’s night-work regulation where relevant, and working time should be announced and documented carefully. For employees, the key is to understand that legality depends not only on how long they worked in total, but also on when, how, and under which shift system they worked. In Turkish labor practice, disputes about working hours are often decided by the details of this structure.
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