Shift pattern calendar generator

How to use your calendar

1. On a phone or tablet, select Edit settings to open the form.
2. Choose a preset such as 4 on 4 off or DuPont, or choose Custom and type your own pattern.
3. Enter the date your pattern starts. This is the first day of the cycle for your first crew.
4. Add crews if you need them. Each crew's offset is how many days later its cycle starts.
5. Pick the year to show. Days before the start date stay blank.
6. Turn on shift times if you want timed events in your calendar file instead of all-day events.
7. Print the year, save it on this device, share a link, or download a calendar file for each crew.

How it works

A shift pattern is a list of day codes that repeats. D is a day shift, N is a night shift, M is a morning shift, E is an afternoon shift and O is a day off. The 4 on 4 off example above has an eight-day cycle.

For every date, the calendar works out where that date falls in the cycle: (date minus start date minus crew offset), divided by the cycle length, keeping the remainder. The remainder is the position in the pattern, and the code at that position is the shift for that day.

Dates are counted as whole calendar days, so time zones and clock changes never move a shift. Leap years are included: 29 February is a normal day in the cycle.

Work days are every day with a shift code (D, N, M or E). Days off and blank days before the start date are not counted.

Calendar files hold one event for each run of days with the same shift. Without shift times they are all-day events. With shift times, each run is one repeating event, and shifts that end at or before their start time finish the next day.

Worked example

4 on 4 off, one crew, starting Sunday, 3 January 2027, showing 2027:

• January work days: 3 to 6, 11 to 14, 19 to 22, 27 to 30 (16 days).
• 7 January is a day off.
• 1 and 2 January are blank, because they are before the start date.
• 183 work days in 2027.

See every preset pattern in our methodology

Common questions

Related tools

• 4 on 4 off calendar
• Who is on shift finder
• Shift hours calculator