Following a year-long UK pilot of a four-day working week, 51% of participating businesses confirmed they had made the model permanent, while 89% said they continued the policy after the pilot finished.

The study, which started in 2022, was conducted by UK-based research think tank Autonomy together with the 4-Day Week Campaign and 4-Day Week Global. It involved 61 companies which agreed to a 32-hour workweek for full-time employees without a reduction in pay. Surveyed at the end of the pilot, all managers and CEOs who were consulted agreed the model had a ‘positive’ or ‘very positive’ impact on their organisation; specifically, 82% of managers reported positive impacts on staff well-being, 50% observed reduced staff turnover and 32% said the policy had noticeably improved their recruitment.

Spain, Iceland and South Africa have started similar pilots, while employers in Belgium are now legally required to offer full-time workers the right to request a four-day workweek.