Off-the-Job Training: What the Rules Require in 2026

The apprentice starts in six weeks, the budget is signed off, and someone has just asked how many hours a week they will be away from the day job. Across the 729 approved apprenticeship standards currently listed on Find a Training Provider, one rule governs the answer, and it is not the 20 per cent figure most managers still quote. Since August 2022 it has been a minimum hours calculation, set out in the Department for Education's off-the-job training guidance, and it changes how you build a rota.

What actually changed, and how many hours does your apprentice need?

The old rule was a proportion. Twenty per cent of the apprentice's normal working hours across the practical period, which meant the target moved every time contracted hours moved. From 1 August 2022 it became a flat floor of six hours a week, calculated across the practical period, according to the Department for Education's off-the-job training guidance. Same principle, far less arithmetic.

In planning terms, that is a number you can hold in your head. A practical period running 52 weeks at six hours a week gives 312 hours of off-the-job training to schedule, staff and evidence, on the basis of the six-hour minimum in the same DfE guidance. That is roughly three-quarters of a day a week, every week, for a year.

Duration is the second moving part. The minimum practical period for an apprenticeship was reduced to eight months from 1 August 2025 under the apprenticeship funding rules. A shorter programme means fewer weeks and so fewer total hours, but the weekly floor does not change while the programme is running. Shorter does not mean lighter.

If your apprentice works part time, or if their hours flex seasonally, the total is not the standard one. Ask your provider to show you the calculation for that specific contract before anyone signs anything, rather than assuming a figure that was designed for a full-time, 52-week programme.

What counts as off-the-job training?

The test is narrower than most employers assume and broader than most managers fear. Training counts when it teaches new knowledge, skills or behaviours set out in the apprenticeship standard, and when it happens inside the apprentice's paid working hours. The DfE guidance on off-the-job training sets out the categories.

• Teaching delivered by the provider: workshops, lectures, live online sessions, structured self-study they have set
• Shadowing, mentoring, coaching and site or industry visits
• Time spent writing assignments, preparing for end-point assessment content, and learning support
• Practical training at the workstation, as long as it teaches something new that maps to the standard

The part that gets missed: a meaningful share of those hours can be delivered by you rather than by the provider. A senior colleague walking an apprentice through a live case, a structured rotation into another team, a mentor session with an agenda. All of it counts if it is planned, relevant to the standard and recorded at the time. Employers who treat off-the-job training as something that only happens off site pay for a classroom day they did not need.

What does not count towards the hours?

Four categories sit outside the minimum, according to the Department for Education's off-the-job training guidance: English and maths qualifications studied alongside the apprenticeship, progress reviews and on-programme assessment, training that is not relevant to the standard, and any training the apprentice does outside their paid working hours.

That last one catches employers out constantly. If an apprentice sits down on a Sunday evening to finish a portfolio task, those hours do not count towards the minimum unless you give them paid time off in lieu, as the same DfE guidance makes clear. Plenty of apprentices choose to study in their own time and there is nothing wrong with that, but it sits on top of the requirement rather than inside it. If your plan quietly relies on evening study to hit the number, the plan does not work.

The other frequent misread is mandatory training. Your annual information security refresher, fire safety, the compliance module everyone does. Unless it teaches something in the standard, it is not off-the-job training, however useful it is.

How do you evidence the hours without building a paperwork industry?

Your provider holds the record. Under the apprenticeship funding rules, planned off-the-job training hours must be set out before the apprenticeship starts and actual delivery must be recorded and evidenced. Your job is to make sure what they record matches what actually happened, and that the plan was realistic in the first place.

Four moves keep the admin proportionate:

• Agree the training plan line by line at sign-up, not at the first review. If the plan assumes a full day a week and your operation cannot release a full day, say so before it is signed.
• Use one log, the provider's. Parallel spreadsheets create disputes rather than assurance.
• Record monthly, not weekly. Weekly logging produces resentment and retrospective guesswork.
• Audit the workplace hours you already deliver. Structured coaching and shadowing that nobody was writing down is usually the difference between a plan that works and one that slips.

If the hours cannot be evidenced, the provider's funding claim for that apprentice is exposed, and that exposure tends to come back to you through the contract and through a programme that stalls at review. The commercial risk is real even where no money changes hands directly.

How should day release, block release or blended delivery change your plan?

The minimum is the same whichever model you choose. What changes is where the pressure lands. Day release gives you a predictable weekly absence and the cleanest evidence trail, at the cost of a permanent hole in the rota on the same day every week. If your service levels depend on Tuesdays, do not pick Tuesdays.

Block release concentrates the hours into intensive weeks, which suits operations with seasonal troughs and teams large enough to absorb a full absence. It is harder on cover planning and easier on the weekly routine.

Blended and fully flexible models look attractive because nothing is fixed. They demand the most discipline from you, because the hours are the ones a line manager has to actively protect against operational pressure. Before you agree to a flexible model, ask who in your business owns the release decision when the week gets busy. If the answer is nobody, choose a fixed model.

Frequently asked questions

Does the apprentice need exactly six hours every single week?

The measure is the planned total across the practical period rather than a rigid weekly count, and the DfE off-the-job training guidance allows the hours to be distributed unevenly. A heavy induction block can offset a lighter month later. What it does not permit is sustained underdelivery that nobody plans to recover.

Does prior learning reduce the hours?

Yes, and it should. Where an apprentice already holds significant relevant knowledge or skills, the apprenticeship funding rules require the provider to assess that prior learning and reduce the content, the duration and the price accordingly. A shorter practical period means fewer total off-the-job hours. Ask to see the assessment before you sign, because it affects your cost and your rota.

Can off-the-job training happen outside working hours?

Only where you compensate for it. Evening and weekend study does not count towards the minimum unless the apprentice is given paid time off in lieu, according to the Department for Education's off-the-job training guidance. Apprentices often study beyond the requirement by choice, which is fine, but you cannot build the plan on it.

Who is accountable if the apprentice is not released?

Both parties, differently. The provider must plan, record and evidence delivery under the apprenticeship funding rules. Your side of the commitment statement is releasing the apprentice for the training. Where release keeps slipping, the practical consequences are a programme that falls behind, a difficult contract conversation, and an apprentice who leaves.

Does English and maths study count towards the hours?

No. Where an apprentice is working towards English or maths qualifications, that study sits on top of the minimum off-the-job hours rather than inside them, per the DfE off-the-job training guidance. Budget the release time separately. Missing this is a common reason a timetable that looked workable on paper collapses in month three.

Before you agree a training plan, check what the standard itself requires. You can review duration, funding band and assessment detail across every published standard on our apprenticeship standards pages, then compare providers on delivery model and Ofsted grade to find one whose approach fits the rota you actually have. Employer obligations are also summarised in the GOV.UK guide to employing an apprentice.