Apple Announces Expanded Employee Benefits for New Parents
Apple today announced a new employee benefit that's designed to ease the transition back to work for new parents, expanding on the 16 weeks of leave that parents are already provided with an additional four-week grace period.
Apple's head of retail and human resources shared details on the changes with Fast Company.
"What we find a lot of times is people are really excited to get back to work," says O'Brien, Apple's head of retail and human resources. "At the same time, [they] feel like they need to make sure things are really stable and successful at home. And that weighs heavy on people's minds, I think."
Apple's new policy will give parents a four-week period after returning from leave where they'll be paid like full-time employees but will have the flexibility to work part-time or set their own hours with a manager's oversight.
The updated transition period will be available to all new parents, including those who adopt or take in foster children (non-birth parents are allowed six weeks of paid leave rather than 16). Retail workers are also able to take advantage of the parental leave changes.
Along with the new transition period, Apple is expanding leave for adoptive parents by four weeks through a Paid Family Care benefit that lets parents take time off for family illness. Apple is also tripling its financial assistance for families that choose to adopt, providing up to $14,000 towards an adoption.
For all employees, Apple is improving its mental wellness benefits and will double the number of free counseling sessions available to employees per year along with providing telemedicine options.
According to O'Brien, Apple is hoping to make it easier for parents to ultimately return to work after a period of leave. "I think many times working parents feel like they need to deal with that quietly and make it seem perfectly seamless," O'Brien told Fast Company. "We all know life is complicated. So [we're] making it really clear that we're supporting them in that journey."
Popular Stories
The iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max are three months away, and there are plenty of rumors about the devices.
Below, we recap key changes rumored for the iPhone 17 Pro models as of June 2025:Aluminum frame: iPhone 17 Pro models are rumored to have an aluminum frame, whereas the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro models have a titanium frame, and the iPhone X through iPhone 14 Pro have a...
Apple will finally deliver the Apple Watch Ultra 3 sometime this year, according to analyst Jeff Pu of GF Securities Hong Kong (via @jukanlosreve).
The analyst expects both the Apple Watch Series 11 and Apple Watch Ultra 3 to arrive this year (likely alongside the new iPhone 17 lineup, if previous launches are anything to go by), according to his latest product roadmap shared with...
Alongside WWDC this week, Logitech announced notable new accessories for the iPad and Apple Vision Pro.
The Logitech Muse is a spatially-tracked stylus developed for use with the Apple Vision Pro. Introduced during the WWDC 2025 keynote address, Muse is intended to support the next generation of spatial computing workflows enabled by visionOS 26. The device incorporates six degrees of...
iPadOS 26 allows iPads to function much more like Macs, with a new app windowing system, a swipe-down menu bar at the top of the screen, and more. However, Apple has stopped short of allowing iPads to run macOS, and it has now explained why.
In an interview this week with Swiss tech journalist Rafael Zeier, Apple's software engineering chief Craig Federighi said that iPadOS 26's new Mac-like ...
Apple's iPhone development roadmap runs several years into the future and the company is continually working with suppliers on several successive iPhone models simultaneously, which is why we often get rumored features months ahead of launch. The iPhone 17 series is no different, and we already have a good idea of what to expect from Apple's 2025 smartphone lineup.
If you skipped the iPhone...
Apple's Terminal app is getting a visual refresh in macOS Tahoe, and it's the first notable design update since the command-line tool debuted.
The updated Terminal will support 24-bit color and Powerline fonts, according to Apple's State of the Platforms presentation at WWDC25. The app will also adopt the new Liquid Glass aesthetic with redesigned themes that align with macOS 26's broader...
Apple today provided developers with a revised version of the first iOS 26 beta for testing purposes. The update is only available for the iPhone 15 and iPhone 16 models, so if you're running iOS 26 on an iPhone 14 or earlier, you won't see the revised beta.
Registered developers can download the new beta software through the Settings app on each device.
The revised beta addresses an...
The Apple Watch Ultra 3 is expected to launch later this year, arriving two years after the previous model with a series of improvements.
While no noticeable design changes are expected for the third generation since the company tends to stick with the same Apple Watch design through three generations before changing it, there are a series of internal upgrades on the way.
By the time the ...
