Shift rotation patterns, as data

Version 1.0.0 · updated 2026-08-03 · CC BY 4.0

What is in it

Twenty-one rotations, each with the plain facts — the cycle written out one day at a time, how long the cycle runs, shift length, the average week, and whether crews rotate between tours.

And then the part that took the work: figures computed from the cycle rather than copied from anywhere.

• Whether the pattern locks to the weekdays. A cycle whose length divides by seven never drifts — so the crew you are on, not the rotation, decides which weekends you get. Ten of the twenty-one are like this, and almost nobody says so.
• Full weekends off a year, counted across 52 weeks from every starting position in the cycle, with the range across crews. A weekend counts only when both days are off.
• The blocks — the cycle read as runs of work and the breaks between them.
• The tightest turnaround — where the tour changes with the least time around it, which is the part of any rotation people actually remember.

A record, in full

{
  "id": "panama-schedule",
  "name": "Panama schedule",
  "alsoKnownAs": null,
  "url": "https://www.policecalendarapp.com/rotating-shifts/panama-schedule/",
  "cycleDays": 14,
  "cycle": [
    "day",
    "day",
    "off",
    "off",
    "day",
    "day",
    "day",
    "off",
    "off",
    "day",
    "day",
    "off",
    "off",
    "off"
  ],
  "cycleCompact": "ddoodddooddooo",
  "daysOnPerCycle": 7,
  "daysOffPerCycle": 7,
  "shiftLength": "12 hours",
  "averageWeekHours": "42 hours",
  "rotatesTours": null,
  "locksToWeekdays": true,
  "fullWeekendsOffPerYear": {
    "min": 0,
    "max": 26,
    "variesByCrew": true
  },
  "blocks": [
    {
      "kind": "day",
      "days": 2
    },
    {
      "kind": "off",
      "days": 2
    },
    {
    
  ...

Using it

The license is CC BY 4.0. Use it commercially, change it, build a product on it — credit the source and you are fine.

A line that does the job:

Shift rotation patterns v1.0.0, BlueShifts — www.policecalendarapp.com/rotating-shifts/data/ — CC BY 4.0

What it is not

These are the common form of each pattern. Agencies run local variations, relief lines and arrangements with no name at all, and a bid or a collective agreement always governs the real schedule. The weekend and turnaround figures are arithmetic on the cycle, not a survey of what departments run. Treat it as the shape of a pattern, not a claim about anyone's roster.

Corrections

If a cycle here does not match how a pattern is genuinely worked, we want to know — the support page reaches us. Fixes go into the next version, and the version number and date at the top change with it.