Kelly Schedule and Kelly Day Calendar
Three 24-hour shifts in five days, then four days off. Make your Kelly calendar for platoon A, B or C below, and read what "Kelly day" means in your department.
- 1F
- 2O
- 3F
- 4O
- 5F
- 6O
- 7O
- 8O
- 9O
Kelly · Platoon A · 2026
January 2026
February 2026
March 2026
April 2026
May 2026
June 2026
July 2026
August 2026
September 2026
October 2026
November 2026
December 2026
Tap a day to see its shift and add a private note (kept only in this browser). Corner mark = public holiday · bar = payday · ring = today.
Check a date, find your crew, compare crews
What am I on?
Which crew am I?
Enter a date you remember and the shift you worked; add more dates if several crews match.
Days off together
All platoons side by side
| Oct 2026 | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Platoon | W7 | T8 | F9 | S10 | S11 | M12 | T13 | W14 | T15 |
| Platoon A | F | O | F | O | F | O | O | O | O |
| Platoon B | O | O | O | F | O | F | O | F | O |
| Platoon C | O | F | O | O | O | O | F | O | F |
1 platoon on duty every day
Public holidays in 2026
- Thu, Jan 1 New Year's Day 24-hour shift
- Mon, Jan 19 Martin Luther King Jr. Day 24-hour shift
- Mon, Feb 16 Washington's Birthday (Presidents' Day) Off
- Mon, May 25 Memorial Day 24-hour shift
- Fri, Jun 19 Juneteenth Off
- Fri, Jul 3 Independence Day (observed) Off
- Sat, Jul 4 Independence Day 24-hour shift
- Mon, Sep 7 Labor Day Off
- Mon, Oct 12 Columbus Day Off
- Wed, Nov 11 Veterans Day Off
- Thu, Nov 26 Thanksgiving Day Off
- Fri, Dec 25 Christmas Day Off
Hours, overtime and pay for 2026
- Shifts
- 123
- Night shifts
- 0
- Days off
- 242
- Hours worked
- 2,952
- Average per week
- 56.6 h
- Full weekends off
- 17
- Longest break
- 4 days
- Overtime hours
- –
- Estimated gross pay
- Enter an hourly rate to estimate pay.
Overtime rule
Common examples: the US FLSA rule of overtime after 40 hours in a workweek (7 days, 40 hours, 1.5×), and the longer 7(k) work periods many fire departments use. Your employer's rules and your contract decide — this is not legal advice.
Estimate only. Not a payslip — your employer's payroll is final. Not tax, legal or employment-contract advice.
Print, save and share — free
Paper and images
Phone calendar and spreadsheet
A one-time .ics file with every shift of the year and its start and end time. Import it into Google, Apple or Outlook Calendar; it does not update by itself.
Share or keep
The link holds only the schedule settings — never your notes or pay rate.
Saved schedules appear here (stored only in this browser).
Pro: live sync, yearbook, crew poster, Excel
Samples drawn live from your settings: Kelly, Platoon A, 2026, overtime after 40 h per 7 days.
Annual Pro
$19 per year
Billed yearly and renews automatically until you cancel. A sync link keeps updating until your paid-through date; after each renewal, come back and press "Get sync link" again for a link that runs to the new date.
Lifetime Pro
$29 once
One payment, no renewal. Every Pro output, and your calendar sync link never expires.
Everything above the Pro section stays free with no account. Full pricing and refund details.
Live calendar sync
Yearbook PDF
Uses the payday and overtime settings above. Your day notes are written into the PDF here in the browser.
Crew poster
Excel workbook
Uses the hourly rate, overtime rule and paydays above. Pay cells are formulas you can edit.
This is a Pro output. Annual Pro is $19/year (renews automatically); Lifetime Pro is $29 once and its sync link never expires.
How the 9-day Kelly cycle works
The Kelly schedule is a fire-service rotation of 24-hour shifts on a 9-day cycle: FOFOFOOOO. You work a 24-hour shift, have a day off, work again, have a day off, work a third shift, and then have four days off before it repeats. That is three shifts — 72 hours — every nine days, with no tour longer than 24 hours and a four-day break in every cycle.
Three platoons share the work. Platoon B starts its cycle three days after Platoon A and Platoon C three days after B, so on every date exactly one platoon is on duty. The chart shows two full cycles from Monday, January 5, 2026: Platoon A works January 5, 7 and 9 and is off from January 10 to 13.
Two meanings of "Kelly day"
The Kelly schedule itself. In departments that run the 9-day rotation above, "Kelly" is the name of the schedule, and the four-day break is sometimes called the Kelly days. This is the version the generator opens with.
An extra day off on a 24/48. In other departments, a Kelly day is a scheduled shift that a firefighter does not work, taken every so many shifts on a 24/48 rotation to reduce average hours. Skipping every seventh shift turns the 3-day cycle into a 21-day personal cycle — FOOFOOFOOFOOFOOFOOOOO — with six shifts instead of seven, or about 48 hours a week instead of 56. Departments stagger who takes which Kelly day so the platoon stays staffed. You can build this exact calendar with the custom cycle builder: load the 24/48 with a Kelly day every seventh shift and change the start date to your own. Because it is one person's calendar rather than a whole platoon's, the coverage line will point out the days nobody in this cycle is on duty — that is expected.
Hours on the Kelly schedule
Three 24-hour shifts per nine days average 56 hours a week — the same as the 24/48 and the 48/96. Over 2026 each platoon works 121–122 shifts; Platoon A in our example works 121 shifts, 2,904 hours, and gets 17–18 full weekends off. Calendar weeks hold two or three shifts: in every 9 weeks, 3 are 72-hour weeks and 6 are 48-hour weeks. With overtime after 40 hours a week that is 840 overtime hours in 2026; on a 28-day 7(k) work period with the 212-hour threshold it is 168. The firefighter shift calendar explains the 7(k) work period; your department's rules and your contract decide.
| Schedule | Cycle | Days | Most days off in a row | Shifts | Hours | Avg hours/week | Full weekends off |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 24/48 | FOO |
3 | 2 | 122 | 2,928 | 56 | 18 |
| 48/96 | FFOOOO |
6 | 4 | 121 | 2,904 | 56 | 25 |
| Kelly | FOFOFOOOO |
9 | 4 | 121 | 2,904 | 56 | 18 |
| 24/48 with a Kelly day | FOOFOOFOOFOOFOOFOOOOO |
21 | 5 | 104 | 2,496 | 48 | 18 |
Pros and cons of the Kelly schedule
Pros
- A four-day break every nine days.
- No 48-hour tours: every shift is followed by at least a day off.
- The same 56-hour average as other three-platoon schedules.
Cons
- Three shifts in five days is a demanding stretch.
- A 9-day cycle drifts through the week and is hard to memorize.
- Single days off between shifts are mostly recovery days.
Kelly vs 24/48 and 48/96
All three give one platoon on duty every day and the same yearly hours; they differ in rhythm. The 24/48 spaces shifts evenly, every third day, so you never get more than 2 days off. The 48/96 joins two shifts into a 48-hour tour and gives 4 days off after each one. The Kelly sits between them: the four-day break of the 48/96 without the 48-hour tour, at the price of a busy five days. To compare them on your own dates, switch the pattern menu above between Kelly, 24/48 and 48/96 with the same platoon and start date and watch the weekends-off and overtime figures change.
Print or sync your Kelly calendar
Once your platoon and start date are in, print the year on one page, save a month or the whole year as a PDF, or download the .ics file so every shift lands in Google, Apple or Outlook Calendar. The Pro sync link keeps the calendar up to date and can show all three platoons. For other rotations, start from the shift calendar generator or see the 12-hour shift schedule guide, the DuPont, 2-2-3, Panama, Pitman, 4 on 4 off and the Continental shift pattern.
Kelly schedule questions
How do I make a Kelly day calendar?
Use the generator at the top of this page: it opens on the 9-day Kelly schedule. Choose platoon A, B or C, then enter your own platoon's cycle day 1: the first shift after your four days off. The other platoons are worked out from it. If your department uses Kelly days on a 24/48 instead, load the custom 24/48 Kelly day example on this page and set your own start date. Then print the Kelly day calendar or download it for your phone.
What is a Kelly schedule?
A Kelly schedule is a 9-day rotation of 24-hour shifts: on, off, on, off, on, then four days off. Three platoons start the cycle three days apart, so one platoon is always on duty, and each works an average of 56 hours a week.
What is a Kelly day?
It depends on the department. On the Kelly schedule, people often call the whole 9-day pattern "the Kelly". On a 24/48, a Kelly day is an extra scheduled day off — for example, every seventh shift is skipped — which brings the average down from 56 hours a week to about 48.
How many hours a week is a Kelly schedule?
56 hours on average: three 24-hour shifts every 9 days. Calendar weeks hold either two or three shifts, so a week is 48 or 72 hours; over 2026 a platoon works 121–122 shifts.
Where does the name Kelly come from?
Several stories link it to a person named Kelly, but we have not found a reliable source for any of them, so we do not repeat one as fact. The pattern is the same whatever the origin.
More shift pattern calendars
- Shift calendar generator
Every preset and your own custom cycle in one generator.
- DuPont schedule calendar
28-day 12-hour rotation for four crews, with a 7-day break.
- 2-2-3 schedule calendar
2 on, 2 off, 3 on over 14 days; every other weekend off.
- Pitman (2-3-2) schedule calendar
2 on, 3 off, 2 on, 2 off, 3 on, 2 off: a 14-day loop common in policing.
- 4 on 4 off shift pattern calendar
An 8-day cycle whose days drift through the week.
- Firefighter shift calendar
24/48, 48/96, Kelly and 24/72 for platoons A, B and C.
Guides
- Panama schedule
How the Panama name relates to the 2-2-3 and Pitman.
- Continental shift pattern
8-hour earlies, lates and nights over 28 days.
- 12-hour shift schedule guide
Every rotating 12-hour pattern compared side by side.