Up until last year, an increasing number of employees were taking holidays before the summer began. This year, that trend appears to have reversed: for the first time in five years, employees took fewer holidays this spring than they did the previous year.
More and more working Belgians are no longer relying solely on their main holiday in July or August. In recent years, the number of holidays taken in the spring has risen steadily, reaching a peak in 2025. Now the trend seems to have reversed – for now
"We can indeed speak of a break in the trend," said Marijke Beelen, holiday expert at Acerta.
During the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, figures showed that employees saved up their holiday entitlement for the autumn. From 2021 onwards, that habit gradually faded year on year, with employees taking more leave in the spring each year.
Beelen described the sharp rise between 2021 (2.12%) and 2022 (2.78, +30.8%) as "particularly striking", as a result of Covid-19 restrictions being lifted.
"This slow increase in holiday take-up between January and May is now coming to an end in 2026. For the first time in five years, employees are once again taking slightly fewer holidays in the spring," she said.
Flemish decrease
In absolute terms, employees in Flanders, Wallonia and Brussels took roughly the same amount of holiday between January and May 2026.
Almost 3.1% of working hours were spent on holidays this spring in each of the regions. However, the overall decline in holiday take-up in the spring is primarily attributable to Flanders. After years of steady growth, the Flemish Region saw a decrease of 3.3% in the spring of 2026 compared with the same period in 2025.
In Wallonia, holiday take-up in the spring of 2026 remained roughly stable (+0.2%) compared with January–May 2025. The Brussels-Capital Region saw a slight decline (-0.5%).
However, compared with 2021 (still in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic), there is still a clear increase in holiday bookings for the period January–May 2026. The increase since 2021 is strongest in Wallonia (+54.6%) and Flanders (+47.4%), and more modest in Brussels (+23.8%).
The larger increase in Wallonia can be partly explained by the fact that, since 2023, the spring half-term holiday has lasted two weeks in both Brussels and Wallonia.
Credit: Belga
Another striking finding is that, while women still took slightly more leave in the spring than men in 2021 (2.16% vs. 2.10%), the situation has reversed in 2026, with 3.17% for men compared with 2.97% for women.
Compared with 2021, the increase among men (+51.2%) is significantly greater than that among women (+37.9%). However, both groups saw a decline in 2026 compared with 2025: men -3.3%, women -1.8%. This is the first decline for both groups since 2021.
Acerta sees the same pattern emerging between younger and older age groups. Today, 20- to 39-year-olds take proportionally more holidays than 45- to 59-year-olds. In 2021, that ratio was the reverse.
However, 60- to 64-year-olds always take the most holidays between January and May (3.74% in 2026), followed by 30- to 34-year-olds (3.37%) and 25- to 29-year-olds (3.22%).
People aged 60 and over generally take most of their statutory holiday entitlement in the spring, possibly because they are less constrained by school holidays when planning their leave.
