The Schengen 90/180 Day Rule Explained

Visitors from outside the EU can stay in the Schengen area for no more than 90 days in any 180-day period. The rule is in Article 6 of the Schengen Borders Code, which says it "entails considering the 180-day period preceding each day of stay". In practice that means the count is checked again on every day you are in the area, so there is no fixed half-year that resets.

To count your own days from your trip dates, use our Schengen 90/180-day calculator. It counts the same way as the European Commission's own short-stay calculator.

How the count works

For any day you are in the Schengen area, take the 180-day period that ends on that day, that day included, and count the days you spent in the area within it. The total must not go above 90.

Three rules decide what counts:

• Arrival and departure days both count. Article 6(2) treats the date of entry as the first day of stay and the date of exit as the last.
• Time on a residence permit or a long-stay visa does not count. Article 6(2) leaves those periods out, and the Commission says holders of an EU residence permit or a long-stay visa are not subject to the 90/180-day rule.
• Days in Cyprus or Ireland do not count. The Commission says the Schengen area is 29 countries, 25 EU member states plus Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland, and that Cyprus and Ireland are not part of it.

The count covers the whole area at once. Moving from one Schengen country to another does not start a new 90 days: the EU says the short-stay period is calculated as a single period for all the countries using the Entry/Exit System.

If you hold a short-stay visa, check the period of authorised stay printed on the visa sticker. The Commission says that if it is shorter than 90 days, you should not use its short-stay calculator, and the same goes for ours.

Two worked examples

These dates were run through both our calculator and the European Commission's short-stay calculator, which give the same answers.

One long trip. You enter on 1 January 2026 and leave on 31 March 2026. That is 90 days (31 + 28 + 31), counting both ends, so on 31 March all 90 days are used.

• You cannot come back on 1 April: that day would be the 91st in its 180-day period.
• On 29 June 2026, the 180-day period runs from 1 January to 29 June and still holds all 90 days.
• On 30 June 2026, the period starts on 2 January, so 1 January has dropped out. You can enter that day.
• Entering on 30 June and staying on, you can stay 90 days, until 27 September 2026: each new day replaces an old day that drops out, until only the new trip is left in the period.

Two short trips. You spend 1 to 10 February 2026 and 1 to 20 May 2026 in the area: 30 days in all.

• On 1 July 2026, the 180-day period runs from 3 January to 1 July and holds 30 days, so 60 are left on that date.
• Entering on 1 July and staying on, you can stay 70 days, until 8 September 2026. The 60 days left on 1 July are not the limit, because the February days drop out of the 180-day period one by one during the stay.

Who the rule applies to

The rule covers short stays by non-EU nationals: people who need a short-stay visa and people who do not. The EU says the EES calculation of authorised stay does not apply to non-EU family members of EU, EEA or Swiss nationals who are accompanying or joining that national in a country other than the national's own. For British passport holders, the UK government's travel advice lists tourism, visiting family or friends, business meetings, cultural or sports events, and short-term studies or training as purposes covered by the 90 days, and says working has different requirements. See Schengen rules for UK citizens.

Visa-exempt visitors will also need an ETIAS travel authorisation once it starts. It is not in operation yet, and the EU says it will announce the specific start date several months before launch. A valid ETIAS travel authorisation allows stays of up to 90 days within any 180-day period.

How your days are recorded now

Since 10 April 2026 the Entry/Exit System (EES) has been fully operational at all external border crossing points. It registers each entry and exit of non-EU visitors electronically and replaces passport stamps. The EU says the EES changes nothing in the rules on short stays.

The EU's EES online tool tells you how many days you are still allowed to stay, using that record. It does not reflect any time in the Schengen area that began before 10 April 2026, regardless of whether that visit ended before or continued after that date. For questions about your remaining stay or the tool's result, the EU says to contact the competent authorities of the Member State where you last entered or exited the Schengen area or, if you have not visited the area since 10 April 2026, the authorities of the Member State you plan to visit.

If you overstay

The EU's EES FAQ says:

• a person who has already stayed 90 days within 180 and tries to enter again will be refused entry, and the refusal is registered in the EES
• a person found to have stayed more than 90 days must be put through return procedures under the Return Directive, with preference given, as a general rule, to voluntary departure
• return decisions are accompanied by an entry ban in certain cases (where no period for voluntary departure has been granted, or where the obligation to return has not been complied with), an entry ban may be issued in others, and both are entered into the Schengen Information System

For British travellers, the UK government's travel advice for France says an overstay may lead to a ban from entering Schengen countries for up to 3 years. The same advice says that to stay longer than 90 days you must meet the French government's entry requirements, and that time in France with a residence permit or long-stay visa does not count towards the 90-day visa-free limit.