DuPont Schedule Generator

The DuPont schedule is a 12-hour rotating shift schedule that keeps four crews covering a job 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Each crew works a 28-day cycle: 4 nights, 3 off, 3 days, 1 off, 3 nights, 3 off, 4 days, then 7 days off in a row.

The four crews run that same cycle one week apart. On any date, one crew works the day shift (7 AM to 7 PM in the generator above), one crew works the night shift (7 PM to 7 AM) and the other two are off.

Over one cycle, each person works 14 twelve-hour shifts, or 168 hours. That’s an average of 42 hours a week, with half of all days off. You’ll also see it called the DuPont 12-hour rotating plan or simply the DuPont rotation. Scheduling guides say it was developed at the DuPont chemical company in the 1950s, though we haven’t found a primary source that confirms it.

Want crews on steady days or steady nights instead? Compare it with the Pitman schedule, or see every rotating shift schedule side by side.

DuPont is a trademark of its owner. We use the name only because it’s what this shift pattern is called. Auto Schedule Maker isn’t affiliated with or endorsed by the company.

Here is one crew’s full cycle, starting on a Monday. Read it one row at a time: each row is a week, and the numbers are the days of the cycle.

The block of 7 days off is the main reason people ask for the DuPont schedule. Every crew gets one every 28 days, so about 13 times a year, without using any vacation time.

In practice the break is longer than it sounds. Your last day shift ends at 7 PM on the Sunday that closes week 3, and your next shift is a night shift that starts at 7 PM on the Monday after week 4. That’s 8 calendar days, or 192 hours, between shifts.

The break also stretches well with a little paid leave. The 4 day shifts in week 3 sit between a 3-day break and the 7-day break. Take those 4 shifts off (48 hours of leave) and you’re off from Monday morning, after your last night, until Monday evening two weeks later: more than 14 days in a row.

The rest of the cycle’s time off is shorter: two 3-day breaks and one single day. Keep in mind that the first “day off” after a night run starts at 7 AM, after you’ve worked all night, so part of it goes to sleep. Counting every date with no shift starting on it, a crew is off 14 of every 28 days.

Reverse DuPont

The reverse DuPont schedule is the same 28-day cycle, started with day shifts instead of nights: 4 days, 3 off, 3 nights, 1 off, 3 days, 3 off, 4 nights, then 7 off. Hours, crews and days off are unchanged.

The difference is where the long break lands. In the reverse version it comes straight after 4 nights, so the break is exactly 7 days (168 hours) from 7 AM to 7 AM, and the first of those days goes to catching up on sleep. The standard version ends its run with day shifts, which gives you the 192-hour break described above. To see it, tick Start with day shifts (reverse DuPont) in the generator.

Modified DuPont

“Modified DuPont” doesn’t name one fixed rotation. It’s used for local changes to the standard plan, and the ones we found in scheduling guides include:

• Removing the single day off between the 3 days and the 3 nights in week 2.
• Adding 8-hour shifts for training, or extra Thursday shifts.
• Adding a fifth crew, which cuts each person’s hours and adds relief for sick days and vacations.

Each of these changes hours or staffing, so the generator doesn’t draw them. It draws the standard and reverse versions exactly.

Some employers also move the cycle’s start day so the 7-day break ends on a chosen weekday. That’s the same rotation with a different start date, which you can set above.

A DuPont crew averages 42 hours a week, but almost no single week is 42 hours. Counted by the day each shift starts, the four weeks are 48, 72, 48 and 0 hours, as in the cycle table above.

Payroll doesn’t count that way. In the US, overtime is usually worked out per workweek, and a night shift that starts on the last evening of a workweek puts its after-midnight hours into the next one. With Sunday-to-Saturday workweeks and the cycle starting on a Monday, the weeks come out like this:

Pros

• A week off every month. The 7-day break comes every 28 days, with 8 full days between shifts.
• Half your days are free. You work 14 shifts per 28 days.
• Equal for everyone. All four crews work the same cycle, so nights, weekends and the long break are shared evenly.
• Easy to plan ahead. The cycle is exactly four weeks, so it repeats on the same weekdays all year.
• Two handovers a day. Twelve-hour shifts mean two shift changes instead of three on an 8-hour plan.

Cons

• A heavy second week. Six 12-hour shifts in 7 days, including a switch from days to nights.
• Frequent changes between days and nights. Each crew changes shift type four times per cycle. Going from days to nights has only one day off in between, so you have to move your sleep fast.
• Weekend work. With a Monday start, each crew works 2 full weekends out of every 4.
• Hard to cover absences. Filling a sick call usually means 12 hours of overtime for someone.
• Uneven paychecks. Workweek hours swing from 12 or fewer in the break week to more than 50.

Health

NIOSH, the federal agency that researches workplace health and safety, says shift work and long hours increase health and safety risks by disturbing sleep and the body’s daily rhythm, and by cutting into recovery and family time. Its guidance for rotating schedules includes keeping consecutive night shifts to a minimum, and it notes that shorter shifts are better tolerated at night than 12-hour ones.

The DuPont schedule’s longest night run is 4 shifts, and each 4-shift run is followed by at least 3 days off. The weak spot is week 2, where the change from days to nights comes after a single day off. Plan your sleep around that switch, and if you have a health condition affected by sleep, talk to your doctor before starting night work.