Shared Care Schedules

This is general information for England & Wales, not legal advice, for advice on your situation, speak to a family solicitor or Citizens Advice.

Once arrangements move toward a genuine shared care pattern, the question stops being who's owed equal time and starts being what actually works, for school runs, work patterns, handovers, and your child's age.

There's no single right split. A pattern that works for a five-year-old rarely suits a teenager, and a schedule that looks fair on paper can fall apart the first time a work rota changes. Think about how your child copes with the gap between contact blocks, whether handovers fall on a school day or a weekend, and how much notice you both need when something has to change. None of that shows up on a custody calculator, it only shows up once you're actually living the pattern week to week. I moved onto a 2-2-5-5 pattern myself from December 2026, so these guides cover both the well-known patterns and the day-to-day logistics of actually running one.

• If you want to understand the most common 50/50 pattern — read The 2-2-5-5 schedule explained.
• If you've agreed a pattern but need to make it work day to day — read Co-Parenting Logistics: How to Make a Shared Custody Schedule Actually Work.