The Full Guide to Maternity Leave in Singapore (2026-2027 Update)

Last updated: 2026. This article was first published in 2020 and has since been revised to reflect the enhanced Government-Paid Maternity Leave (GPML) and Shared Parental Leave (SPL) rules effective from 1 April 2025 and 1 April 2026.

Bringing a new life into the world is exciting, exhausting, and honestly a little overwhelming to plan for – especially when you’re also trying to figure out what it means for your job. The good news is that Singapore’s maternity leave framework has gotten more generous in the last two years, and a few rules that used to trip people up (like the old marriage requirement) have been removed entirely.

This guide breaks down everything you need to know about maternity leave Singapore rules for 2026 and beyond – how many weeks you’re entitled to, who pays for it, and what’s new with Shared Parental Leave.

In this post, we’ll cover:

1. What Government-Paid Maternity Leave (GPML) is and how many weeks you get
2. Eligibility – and why marital status no longer matters
3. Who pays for maternity leave, and the payment caps
4. Notice periods and how to apply
5. Special situations (twins, premature births, stillbirth, adoption, self-employed mums)
6. Your job protection while on leave
7. How Shared Parental Leave (SPL) now adds up to 10 more weeks
8. Planning your leave dates
9. Frequently asked questions

What Is Government-Paid Maternity Leave (GPML)?

Government-Paid Maternity Leave, or GPML, is Singapore’s paid leave scheme for working mothers, set out under the Child Development Co-Savings Act and the Employment Act. It gives eligible mothers time – and pay – to recover from childbirth and bond with their newborn, without having to choose between their income and their health.

So, how many weeks is maternity leave in Singapore? It depends mainly on your child’s citizenship:

• 16 weeks of Government-Paid Maternity Leave if your child is a Singapore citizen and you meet the employment criteria.
• 12 weeks of maternity leave under the Employment Act if your child is not a Singapore citizen, or if you don’t meet the GPML criteria.

You can start maternity leave up to 4 weeks before your delivery date , and no later than the delivery date itself. All leave must be used within 12 months of your child’s date of birth.

Am I Eligible? (And Why Marriage No Longer Matters)

Here’s the biggest change since we last wrote about this topic: you no longer need to be married to the child’s father to qualify for maternity leave in Singapore. This requirement has been dropped, so single and unmarried mothers now have the same access to GPML as married mothers, as long as they meet the other criteria.

To qualify for 16 weeks of GPML, you need to:

• Have a child who is a Singapore citizen
• Have worked for your employer (or been self-employed) for at least 3 continuous months before your child’s birth
• If self-employed, have lost income while on maternity leave
• Give at least 4 weeks’ notice before starting your leave, or inform your employer as soon as possible of your delivery

That notice period is worth flagging on its own: it used to be just 1 week, but under the current framework you’re expected to give your employer 4 weeks’ notice. Miss that window without a good reason, and you may only receive half your maternity pay – so it pays (literally) to plan ahead.

If you don’t meet the GPML criteria:

You’re still entitled to 12 weeks of maternity leave under the Employment Act, as long as you’re covered by the Act and have served your employer for at least 3 continuous months before delivery. The first 8 weeks are paid at your gross rate of pay if you have fewer than 2 living children at the time of delivery; the last 4 weeks depend on your employment contract.

Foreign employees and Permanent Residents are covered here too – citizenship of the child is what determines GPML eligibility, not the mother’s own nationality.

Who Pays for Maternity Leave in Singapore? (Cost & Payment Caps)

A question we get a lot from employers: who actually foots the bill for maternity leave, and how much does it cost the business? Here’s how the cost is split between employer and government under GPML:

In practice, this means your salary continues as normal throughout your maternity leave – your employer pays you directly, then claims reimbursement from the government for the portion above. If you’re on the 12-week Employment Act track instead, your employer pays the first 8 weeks and the last 4 weeks are unpaid unless your contract says otherwise.

Does service charge count towards maternity leave pay?

This is a common question for employees in F&B, hotels, and other service-charge industries. Maternity leave pay is based on your gross rate of pay – your basic salary plus fixed, contractual monthly allowances. It excludes overtime, bonuses, reimbursements, and productivity incentive payments. Service charge is typically distributed as a variable, pooled amount rather than a fixed contractual sum, which generally places it outside the gross rate of pay used for GPML computation, similar to how bonuses and productivity payments are treated.

That said, MOM and MSF don’t name “service charge” specifically in their published wage definitions, so the actual treatment can depend on how it’s structured in your contract of service. If your service charge is paid as a fixed, regular, CPF-attracting amount rather than a variable share of collections, it may be treated differently. Employees and employers who are unsure should check directly with MOM or the GPL Portal rather than assume either way, since getting this wrong affects both the employee’s pay and the employer’s reimbursement claim.

For employers, this structure means the real out-of-pocket cost of a first or second child’s maternity leave is generally limited to 8 weeks of salary, since the rest is reimbursed. It’s worth budgeting for this cash-flow gap between paying the employee and receiving reimbursement, especially for smaller companies.

How to Apply for Maternity Leave

If you’re employed:

1. Give your employer at least 4 weeks’ notice before your leave starts (or inform them as soon as possible after delivery).
2. Agree with your employer on how and when you’ll take your leave.
3. Submit the declaration form (GPMD1) to your employer, along with the required supporting documents.
4. Your employer applies for reimbursement through the Government-Paid Leave (GPL) Portal.

If you’re self-employed:

1. Keep a personal log of the maternity leave dates you take.
2. Submit your claim online via the GPL Portal no later than 3 months after your last day of maternity leave.
3. Track your application status on the portal – processing typically takes around 14 weeks from when all required information is received.

Special Situations Worth Knowing About

• Twins or triplets: Treated as a single delivery. Employers aren’t required to provide double maternity benefits.
• Premature birth: Leave starts from your child’s actual birth date, or earlier if you and your employer mutually agree.
• Falling ill during maternity leave: You’re not entitled to separate paid sick leave during this period.
• Stillbirth: Mothers whose child would have been a Singapore citizen may still qualify for GPML if they meet the relevant requirements. If not, you may be able to claim under the Government-Paid Maternity Benefit (GPMB) scheme instead.
• Adoption: Adoptive mothers may be entitled to Adoption Leave rather than maternity leave – eligibility follows a similar framework based on the Formal Intent to Adopt (FIA) date.
• Ineligible for GPML? You may still qualify for the Government-Paid Maternity Benefit (GPMB), provided you’ve worked at least 90 days in the 12 months before your pregnancy (across one or multiple employers, or self-employment).

Can My Employer Dismiss Me While I’m on Maternity Leave?

No. It’s an offence for an employer to dismiss, or give notice of dismissal to, an employee while she’s on maternity leave. This protection now extends to fathers on paternity leave and to adoptive parents on adoption leave as well, following amendments that took effect from 1 April 2025. Employers who breach this can face prosecution, fines, or imprisonment.

Employers also have a duty to notify MOM if a migrant worker on their team is pregnant, and cannot ask an employee to work during the first 4 weeks of her confinement.

Shared Parental Leave (SPL): Up to 10 More Weeks From April 2026

This is the part of the framework that’s changed the most, and it’s a big deal for families. Shared Parental Leave (SPL) is a separate, government-paid pool of leave that both parents can draw from – and unlike the old shared maternity leave arrangement, it does not get carved out of the mother’s 16-week GPML. She keeps her full entitlement either way.

Here’s how the SPL pool has grown:

Combined with 16 weeks of GPML and 4 weeks of Government-Paid Paternity Leave (GPPL), eligible families can now access up to 30 weeks of paid parental leave in their child’s first year.

A few things to know about SPL:

• It’s split equally by default, but parents can mutually agree to reallocate it.
• Mothers are eligible regardless of marital status. Fathers need to be, or have been, lawfully married to the child’s mother at some point between conception and the child’s birth (or within 12 months after).
• SPL can only be taken after maternity leave (for mothers) or paternity leave (for fathers) has been fully used up.
• It must be taken within 12 months of the child’s birth.
• Reallocations made within 4 weeks of the birth don’t need employer sign-off; changes made after that window require agreement from both employers.
• Unlike GPML and GPPL, there’s no specific statutory offence for dismissing someone while they’re on SPL – though general wrongful dismissal protections still apply, and employees who feel they’ve been treated unfairly can raise it with the Tripartite Alliance for Dispute Management (TADM).

For HR teams, this also means it’s now entirely possible to have two employees – or an employee and their spouse at another company – on SPL at the same time. Early conversations about leave timing go a long way for manpower planning.

Planning Your Leave Dates

You don’t have to take your maternity leave in one continuous block if that doesn’t suit you. Depending on what you and your employer agree on, you can:

• Take it as a default block: all 16 (or 12) weeks continuously, starting up to 4 weeks before delivery.
• Split it by mutual agreement: take the first 8 weeks continuously, then spread the remaining 8 weeks flexibly over the 12 months after your child’s birth.
• Calculate it flexibly by working days: 8 weeks x the number of days you work per week, capped at 48 working days (for the 16-week entitlement).

If you’re going the flexible route, it’s worth agreeing upfront with your employer on how your performance will be assessed during that period, whether you can switch back to a continuous block, and what happens to unused flexible leave if you resign.

Manage Maternity Leave (and SPL) With Talenox

Tracking who’s on GPML, GPPL, SPL, or a flexible leave arrangement – sometimes across two employees at once – can get complicated fast, especially now that the leave pool has grown to 30 weeks per family. The Talenox Leave module is built to handle exactly this: preset, country-specific leave types, automatic entitlement calculations, and a clear view of your team’s leave calendar, so nothing falls through the cracks.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many weeks is maternity leave in Singapore in 2026? 16 weeks if your child is a Singapore citizen and you meet the GPML criteria, or 12 weeks under the Employment Act if not.

Do I need to be married to claim maternity leave in Singapore? No. The marriage requirement has been removed – unmarried and single mothers can qualify for GPML on the same basis as married mothers.

How much notice do I need to give before going on maternity leave? At least 4 weeks for GPML. If you’re on the 12-week Employment Act track, the notice period is 1 week.

Who pays for maternity leave – the employer or the government? Both. For the first and second child, your employer pays the first 8 weeks and the government reimburses the last 8 weeks (capped at $10,000 per 4 weeks, up to $20,000 total). For the third child onwards, the government reimburses all 16 weeks (capped at $10,000 per 4 weeks, up to $40,000 total).

Does service charge count towards maternity leave pay in Singapore? Generally no. Maternity leave pay is based on your gross rate of pay (basic salary plus fixed contractual allowances), which excludes variable payments like bonuses and productivity incentives. Service charge, being typically variable and pooled, is usually excluded on the same basis – but check your specific contract terms with MOM or MSF if you’re unsure, since this isn’t explicitly spelled out in the official wage definitions.

Can my employer terminate me while I’m on maternity leave? No. It’s illegal for an employer to dismiss or give notice of dismissal to an employee on maternity leave, and this protection now also covers paternity and adoption leave.

What is Shared Parental Leave (SPL) and how many weeks is it? SPL is a separate, government-paid leave pool that parents can share, on top of GPML and GPPL. It’s 6 weeks for children born between 1 April 2025 and 31 March 2026, and 10 weeks for children born from 1 April 2026 onwards.

Does taking Shared Parental Leave reduce the mother’s 16-week maternity leave? No. SPL is provided in addition to the mother’s full GPML entitlement, not deducted from it.

Is maternity leave in Singapore mandatory for employers? Yes, for eligible employees. It’s a statutory right under the Child Development Co-Savings Act and the Employment Act – employers cannot legally deny it if the employee meets the eligibility criteria.

Disclaimer: This article is for general informational purposes and reflects the rules in place as of 2026. Leave policies can be updated by the Ministry of Manpower (MOM) and Ministry of Social and Family Development (MSF), so always check mom.gov.sg and profamilyleave.msf.gov.sg for the latest official figures before making decisions.