How often should you take screen breaks at work?

How often, how long

There is no single proven schedule. Guidance from the UK’s Health and Safety Executive (HSE) favours frequency over length: take short breaks often rather than longer ones less often, and use them to get up, move around, or at least stretch and change posture.

For your eyes, the usual advice is the 20-20-20 rule: every 20 minutes, look at something about 20 feet (6 metres) away for 20 seconds. The evidence is mixed. In a 2023 trial, reminders to follow it eased symptoms over two weeks, with the benefit gone a week after people stopped (Talens-Estarelles, 2023), and another 2023 study found 20-second breaks during a 40-minute task made no difference (Johnson and Rosenfield, 2023). A look-away is not a substitute for getting up: think of it as an extra, between the longer breaks.

What UK guidance says

The Health and Safety (Display Screen Equipment) Regulations cover workers who use screens daily, for continuous periods of an hour or more, including home workers. Employers must assess workstations, reduce the risks, give training, and plan work so there are breaks or changes of activity. They must also arrange an eye test for a screen user who asks for one, and pay for glasses only if the test shows special glasses are needed for screen work.

On timing, HSE says plainly that there is no legal guidance about how long and how often breaks should be: it depends on the work. In most jobs, switching to other tasks gives natural breaks; where a job has none, employers should plan rest breaks. Ideally, people should be able to choose when to take them.

HSE also says screen work does not cause permanent damage to the eyes, though long stretches can bring tired eyes, discomfort and headaches. This page summarises HSE’s public guidance and isn’t legal advice; rules in other countries differ.

Breaks between meetings and calls

Back-to-back video calls are where breaks disappear. Two calendar settings help: Google Calendar’s speedy meetings shortens new events of the default length, 30 and 45-minute ones by 5 minutes and longer ones by 10, and classic Outlook for Microsoft 365 can end meetings a few minutes early (or start them late), by amounts you set. Use the gap to stand up and look out of a window, not to check your phone.

During a long call, turn your camera off for a minute and look away, or stand while you listen. After it, take the break your reminder held back rather than going straight into email.