How many hours per week can I work part-time in Austria during the semester, and what is the typical monthly earnings range?

Austria's rule is one flat cap regardless of your job type, but what you actually take home depends heavily on the hourly rate you can land, which varies more by sector and German ability than most students expect.

The Work Hour Limit

• Weekly cap: 20 hours a week during the semester on a Student Residence Permit, the Aufenthaltsbewilligung for students.
• Employer requirement: your employer must obtain an employment permit from Austria's Public Employment Service (AMS); for jobs at or under 20 hours a week, no labour-market test is required.
• Marginal-employment threshold: Austria's 2026 geringfügig, or marginal employment, line is €551.10 a month, which changes your social-insurance treatment but does not cap what you're allowed to earn.
• Full-time in breaks: most student visa holders can work beyond 20 hours during official semester breaks, subject to the same employer permit rules.

What 20 Hours a Week Actually Earns

These are gross figures. Office, technical and working-student roles in Vienna typically pay toward the upper end of this range, while hospitality and retail sit closer to the bottom.

This Information Is Also Available On

Austrian Public Employment Service (AMS), Austria's Federal Ministry migration information portal.

My Advice

Don't assume the marginal-employment threshold of €551.10 is your earnings ceiling; students confuse this with a work-hour or income cap when it's actually a tax and social-insurance category. If your German is conversational, working-student and office roles in Vienna, Graz or Linz will pay noticeably better than hospitality shifts, so it's worth investing a semester in language classes before job-hunting seriously.