Rotating Shift Calendar

The shift calendar paints on-duty and off-duty days on a month grid for three common rotation patterns: 4-on/3-off, 5-on/2-off, and Panama 2-2-3. You pick a start date that is an on-day (or as the form defines the phase) and a month to view. It is a pattern visualizer, not a labor-law scheduler, not overtime advice, and not a timesheet.

The three patterns

4-on/3-off repeats seven days: four duty, three off. Over a month the duty days walk across weekdays, so a person is not always off on Saturday. 5-on/2-off looks like a conventional Mon–Fri week only when the start date is a Monday; if the start is a Wednesday, the two off days are not Saturday–Sunday.

Panama 2-2-3 (also called 2-2-3 or a Pitman-style 12-hour rotation in many workplaces) uses a 14-day block: two on, two off, three on, then two off, two on, three off, depending on the exact encoding the form uses. The important teaching point is that Panama is a 14-day repeating mask, not a 14-day equal-interval payday walker.

How to phase the pattern

The start date sets where you are in the cycle. Two employees on the same 4-on/3-off pattern can be offset by one day and never share a day off. Enter each person’s true on-day start rather than the team’s hire date. Changing month view without changing the start date should keep the same global phase so March and April line up.

This is not biweekly calendar: that tool marks every 14th date as an event, it does not color on versus off. It is not the workday calendar, which highlights all Monday–Friday for an office week.

Worked examples

A fire-department candidate visualizes 24-hour 4-on/3-off for a month in 2026 to see how many weekends are on-duty. The grid does not compute FLSA overtime or Kelly days. Those are contract terms.

A nurse on Panama 2-2-3 enters the first on-day of the current cycle and prints the month to plan childcare. They compare federal observed holidays on 2026 holidays because a holiday on an off day is not extra pay on this picture—pay rules are out of scope.

5-2 is not automatically weekends off

If someone wants Saturday–Sunday off every week, they need a start phase that places the two off days on those dates every seven-day loop. A 5-2 that starts on Thursday puts off days on Tuesday–Wednesday. The grid shows that honestly. Do not assume 5-2 means office hours.

Rotating 5-2 that moves days off each week is a different pattern this page does not offer. Only the three named masks are drawn.

Labor law and this picture

Hours per shift, 8 versus 12 versus 24, union minimum rest, and consecutive-day caps are not encoded. A 4-on block of 12-hour shifts is 48 hours of work in four days; the grid still only shows four on cells. Do not use cell counts as hour counts.

Night shifts that start on one civil date and end on the next still occupy the start date’s cell unless your workplace assigns the shift to the end date. Pick a convention and stick to it in the start date.

Month edges

Patterns continue across month boundaries. The first of the month may be mid-block. That is expected. Generating only one month does not reset the cycle to “four on starting on the 1st” unless the 1st is actually an on-day in phase.

Leap day is just another civil date in the mask. A 4-on/3-off cycle does not skip February 29.

Limits

No export of ICS duty events, no multi-employee roster, no coverage heatmap. Print the month. For pay dates along a 14-day cycle use the biweekly walker, which is dates, not on/off coloring.

For a year of office weekdays, use workday calendar. Keep this URL for rotation masks.

Coverage conversations

A supervisor comparing two employees on 4-on/3-off should generate two prints with two start dates rather than coloring one grid with two pens from memory. Offset phases are easy to mis-draw by hand across a month boundary. The month picture is the artifact to bring to a scheduling meeting.

Panama 2-2-3 over a 14-day block means some weekends are fully on, some fully off, and some split. Candidates who assume every other weekend off should read a month of Panama coloring before signing. The grid will contradict that assumption in many phases.

Holidays on on-days

A federal observed holiday that lands on an on-day is still an on-cell unless the workplace grants the holiday off and the employee is not scheduled. This visualizer will not blank the cell. Compare 2026 holidays and apply contract language after you see the color.

4-on/3-off across February 29

Leap day is one more cell in the seven-day 4-on/3-off loop. The pattern does not pause. A person whose fourth on-day would have been March 1 in a common year may see that on-day on February 29 in a leap year. Generate February of the leap year; do not copy February from the previous common year and squeeze in a cell.