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Confirmed

Brazil’s Senate approves a 40-hour week, with implementation still ahead

Brazil’s Senate approved a constitutional reform on October 14, 2026 to end the system of six working days followed by one rest day. Passed in two rounds by 75 votes to one, it provides for a 40-hour weekly ceiling and two paid rest days without wage cuts.

Archive view of the Brazilian Senate chamber in 2007.
Brazilian Senate chamber: archive image from 2007, exact date uncertain. Illustration, not a photograph of the 2026 vote. Agência Brasil, CC BY 3.0 BR. — Agência Brasil / Wikimedia Commons — CC BY 3.0 BR (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/br/). Archives de 2007 ; date exacte incertaine, sans modification.

The vote, recorded in the legislative file and covered by AFP and Agência Brasil, completes parliamentary consideration of a text already passed by the lower house. Since the Senate made no changes, Congress must now promulgate it.

The reform does not immediately move all employees to 40 hours. According to Agência Brasil, the ceiling is to fall from 44 to 42 hours two months after promulgation, with two weekly rest days, and then to 40 hours twelve months later.

The practical issue is therefore the transition: the vote sets a new working arrangement, but implementation remains ahead.

Sources 3