Tennessee break laws: a 30-minute unpaid break for anyone scheduled 6 consecutive hours, never in the first hour

The short answer

Tennessee has one break rule for adult employees, in Tenn. Code 50-2-103(h):

• An employee scheduled to work six consecutive hours must be given a 30-minute unpaid meal or rest break.
• The break may not be scheduled during or before the first hour of the shift.
• Exception: workplaces where the nature of the business gives ample opportunity to take an appropriate meal break anyway.
• Waiver: an employee principally employed serving food or beverages, who receives tips and reports them, may waive the break in writing, on a form the employer provides that states the right being waived, how long the waiver lasts and how to rescind it. Either side can cancel with seven calendar days' notice. Coercing a waiver is prohibited.

There is no requirement for shorter rest breaks in Tennessee. If you give 10-minute breaks, the federal rule makes them paid time. Minors have the same 30-minute rule under the state child labor act, for six consecutive hours of work.

What "scheduled" means for the rota

The trigger is the schedule, not the hours actually worked. A person scheduled for five and a half hours who stays an extra hour was not scheduled for six, and the statute does not technically bite, though the safe habit is to give the break whenever the day will reach six. A person scheduled for six hours is owed the break even if they end up leaving early.

"Not during or before the first hour" rules out the common shortcut of a break at the start. On a 6-hour shift from 11am to 5pm, the earliest lawful start for the break is noon; the practical window is 1pm to 3pm.

Paid or unpaid

The statute says unpaid. Federal law adds the condition: a meal period is unpaid only when the employee is completely relieved of duty. A server who keeps a table, a cashier who covers the register while eating, a cook who answers the ticket printer: those 30 minutes are working time and must be paid, whatever the schedule shows. If your time clock auto-deducts 30 minutes, the schedule has to make the break possible and the record has to show it was taken.

Short breaks of 5 to 20 minutes that you choose to give are paid and count toward the 40 hours that trigger overtime (29 CFR 785.18).

The server waiver, done properly

Restaurants use the waiver a lot; it is only valid if the paperwork is right:

1. The employee's main job is serving food or drink to customers, and they receive and report tips.
2. The request is in writing, on a form the employer set up.
3. The form acknowledges the right to a 30-minute unpaid break on a six-hour shift, says the employee waives it knowingly and voluntarily, and states how long the waiver lasts and how to rescind it.
4. Nobody was pressured. A waiver signed as a condition of getting shifts is coercion.
5. Rescission by either side takes effect after seven days' notice.

Keep the signed form with the personnel file and note the waiver on the schedule so a manager does not deduct a break the person waived and worked through, or schedule one for a person who waived it.

The federal rules that do the rest

Tennessee has no state overtime law and no state minimum wage. The FLSA applies:

• Overtime after 40 hours in the workweek, at time and a half, with paid short breaks counted in. No daily overtime.
• Minimum wage $7.25, with the tip credit rules for tipped staff.
• Nursing mothers: reasonable break time and a private, non-bathroom space for one year after the child's birth, under the PUMP Act.

Building it into the schedule

1. Write a 30-minute break into every shift of six hours or more, starting after the first hour, ideally mid-shift.
2. Make it a clock-out and clock-in so the deduction is defensible.
3. Flag waivers on the roster and file the forms.
4. Give a paid 10-minute break per four hours even though Tennessee does not require it; it is what keeps the six-hour rule from being the only rest anyone gets.
5. Watch the week, not the day: 40 hours is the only overtime line.

Squadra writes the break inside the shift with a start time, warns when a shift of six hours has none, records the meal break as a clock-out and clock-in, and totals hours per person against 40. Free up to 10 employees: see the pricing.

For the states around Tennessee: Kentucky requires a lunch period between the third and fifth hour plus a paid 10-minute rest per four hours; Georgia, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas, Missouri, Virginia and North Carolina have no adult break law. The national picture: break laws in the US.

*Sources: Tenn. Code Ann. 50-2-103(h); Tennessee Department of Labor and Workforce Development, "Wages and breaks". Rules as in force on September 20, 2026. General information, not legal advice.*