For the third year in a row, mental health remains at or near the top of the list when HR leaders describe why employees are requesting workplace accommodations. In our 2026 State of Leave and Accommodations report, 54% of HR leaders named mental health conditions as one of the top three drivers of accommodation requests at their organization, just ahead of physical injury recovery (53%) and chronic physical conditions (53%).
What has shifted is the shape of the request. Mental health as a reason for taking leave has declined steadily, from 55% of leave requests in 2023 to 34% in 2026. But mental health accommodations have held firm. Employees appear to be asking for support that allows them to keep working, rather than time away from work altogether. That distinction matters for how you design your program: your interactive process needs to be as ready to evaluate a flexible schedule or a remote work request as it is to process a continuous leave.
Anxiety and Depression Remain the Most Common Invisible Disabilities in the Workplace
Anxiety and depression fall under the category of invisible disabilities: conditions that are not visible to a colleague or manager, but that can significantly affect someone’s ability to perform their job. According to the National Institute of Mental Health, more than one in five U.S. adults experience a diagnosable mental illness in a given year, and roughly 8% experience at least one major depressive episode annually. Anxiety disorders remain the most commonly diagnosed mental health condition among U.S. adults.
Both conditions are recognized as disabilities under the ADA when they substantially limit a major life activity, and both entitle an employee to request a reasonable accommodation. In practice, that means most HR teams are managing these requests regularly, whether or not they are labeled that way.
In the workplace, anxiety can affect an employee’s ability to give presentations, manage deadlines, or navigate day to day interpersonal interactions. Depression often shows up as difficulty concentrating, fatigue, reduced engagement, or trouble completing tasks that used to feel routine. Because these symptoms can be inconsistent and easy to misread as a performance or attitude issue, they are also among the accommodation categories most likely to be mishandled by an untrained manager.
Supporting Employee Mental Health with Leave, Accommodations, and Everything in Between is a joint resource from AbsenceSoft and Modern Health that draws on the latest workforce data to help HR leaders build mental health support that is operationally sound, legally compliant, and genuinely responsive to the people it serves.
What Our 2026 Research Shows About the Mental Health Accommodations Experience
Our 2026 Employee Experience survey asked employees who had recently requested a job accommodation to describe what happened next. Mental health was the second most common reason cited overall, behind only recovery from illness, injury, or surgery.
The generational breakdown is worth paying attention to. Mental health was the top reason for accommodation requests among Gen Z employees (31%) and the top reason among millennials as well (23%, tied closely with illness and injury recovery). Among Gen X and baby boomer employees, mental health still appeared in the top three reasons, though physical recovery and chronic conditions were more common.
Among employees who requested a mental health accommodation specifically, the most common friction points were:
- The process took longer than expected: 30%
- Worry about retaliation or being treated differently: 20%
- Feeling discouraged from asking in the first place: 16%
These figures are notably higher than the friction rates reported for physical illness or injury accommodations, where the top concern (process taking longer than expected) was cited by 24% of respondents. That gap suggests mental health requests are still treated with more hesitation, both by the employees requesting them and by the managers and HR teams processing them.
We also asked employees who requested a mental health accommodation to describe their experience more directly. The responses point to a program that is functional but not yet fully trusted:
- 19% said they felt comfortable disclosing their condition to request the accommodation
- 19% said they received the same respectful, confidential treatment as someone requesting an accommodation for a physical condition
- 16% said they worried about being judged or labeled as difficult or not capable
- 14% said their manager or HR treated the request like any other health matter
- 13% said they feared the request would affect their career or future opportunities
- 8% said the process itself worsened their symptoms
- 7% said their employer seemed skeptical that mental health conditions qualify for accommodation at all
Read together, these numbers describe a compliance obligation that most organizations are meeting on paper, but not always meeting in spirit. An employee can receive their accommodation and still walk away from the process feeling exposed or doubted.
Confidentiality is the Foundation of Trust
Every accommodation request requires an employee to disclose something personal, and mental health disclosures tend to carry a heavier weight than most. In our broader accommodations research, 8% of employees said their manager or coworkers were told private medical details, and 9% said their medical information was shared more widely than they expected.
For mental health requests specifically, fear of retaliation was the second most cited concern, at 20%. When employees do not trust that their disclosure will stay contained to the people who need to know, they are less likely to come forward, and more likely to withhold information that would help HR find the right accommodation. That has real compliance consequences: a request that is never made cannot be properly evaluated, documented, or granted.
Keeping the reason for an accommodation private, and limiting communication to only those who need it to implement the accommodation, is one of the simplest and most effective ways to build trust in your process.
Reasonable Accommodations for Anxiety and Depression
Most accommodations for anxiety and depression are low cost and straightforward to implement. According to the Job Accommodation Network, common accommodations include:
- A flexible or modified schedule to allow time for treatment or therapy
- A private space or designated area for breaks
- Permission to work with a support person or service animal, where applicable
- Help identifying and reducing exposure to specific workplace triggers
- Uninterrupted time away from communication tools during off hours
Our own data reflects similar patterns. Across all accommodation types, flexible or reduced schedules and remote work were the two most requested accommodations across every generation we surveyed, from Gen Z to baby boomers. For many employees managing anxiety or depression, the accommodation they need is not specialized equipment. It is control over when, where, and how they work.
Where the Interactive Process Breaks Down
The ADA requires employers to engage in an interactive process with any employee who requests an accommodation, and mental health requests are where that process is most likely to run into trouble.
Managers are often the first point of contact. In our research, 36% of employees said they went directly to their manager to request an accommodation, and managers were the primary point of contact throughout the process for another 35%. That places a significant amount of compliance responsibility on frontline managers who may have little to no training in how to recognize a request, respond appropriately, or route it to HR.
Neurodiversity-related accommodations, which often overlap with mental health conditions, showed the highest rate of manager discomfort in our survey. Nearly a quarter of employees (24%) said their manager appeared uncomfortable or unsupportive when they asked for help. That discomfort tends to slow the process down and can discourage an employee from following through on a request they are legally entitled to make.
Only 69% of employers in our 2026 survey said they provide routine training to managers on accommodations policy, including the ADA. Another 24% cover it only during onboarding, and 7% offer no formal training at all. Given how often managers are the first, and sometimes only, point of contact for a mental health accommodation request, that training gap represents real exposure.
Building a Process That Holds Up, for Employees and for Compliance
A few consistent practices separate the organizations that handle mental health accommodations well from those that create unnecessary risk and unnecessary harm.
Offer a discreet way to request an accommodation. A self-service portal allows an employee to initiate a request without a face to face conversation they may not feel ready to have. It also creates a documented record from the first point of contact, which supports your compliance file if the request is ever questioned.
Train managers specifically on mental health and neurodiversity requests. General ADA training is a starting point, but managers benefit from practicing how to respond to a disclosure of anxiety or depression without minimizing it, questioning it, or escalating it unnecessarily.
Limit who knows why. Keep the reason for an accommodation confined to the people directly involved in evaluating and implementing it. This is one of the most consistent drivers of trust across every accommodations dataset we have collected.
Follow up after the accommodation is in place. Symptoms and needs can change. A brief, periodic check in signals that the accommodation was not a box to check, and gives you an early opportunity to adjust if it is not working.
Avoid unnecessary recertification for stable conditions. Repeated requests for updated documentation on a long-term, stable diagnosis can feel like the employee’s word was never sufficient the first time. Where the law allows discretion, use it.
Move quickly. Response speed is one of the strongest predictors of a positive accommodations experience across every category we track, and mental health requests are particularly sensitive to delay.
How AbsenceSoft Supports Compliant, Consistent Accommodations Management
AbsenceSoft centralizes every accommodation request, medical document, and interactive process step in a single system, which gives HR and benefits teams a consistent, auditable record no matter who initiated the request or which manager was involved. The platform’s guided interactive process helps ensure every request, physical or mental health related, receives the same standard of documentation and follow through.
AbsenceSoft’s intelligent automation capabilities are built to reduce administrative burden around intake and case management, while keeping compliance decisions rules based and human governed. AI does not make eligibility or accommodation decisions on your behalf. It is there to give your team more time back for the part of the process that technology cannot replace: the conversation with the employee.
The Bottom Line
Mental health accommodations are not a niche compliance issue. They are one of the most common requests HR teams manage today, and the data shows employees are still navigating a process that can feel slower, less trusted, and more uncertain than accommodations for physical conditions. Closing that gap does not require a large investment. It requires consistent training, a confidential process, and a system built to hold every request, regardless of the reason behind it, to the same standard.
To see how AbsenceSoft can help your organization manage accommodations consistently and compliantly, schedule a demo today.
FAQ on accommodations for anxiety and depression
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Yes. Anxiety and depression are recognized as disabilities under the ADA when they substantially limit a major life activity, which can include concentrating, communicating, sleeping, or working. Employees with either condition are entitled to request a reasonable accommodation, and employers are required to engage in the interactive process once that request is made.
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Not necessarily. An employee generally needs to communicate that they have a condition affecting their ability to perform their job and that they need support. Employers can request medical documentation to support the request, but the standard should be applied consistently, whether the condition is physical or mental health related. A platform like AbsenceSoft helps standardize what documentation is requested and when, so the process feels consistent across every case type.
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Common accommodations include a flexible or modified schedule, remote work, additional breaks, a quiet workspace, or adjustments to how and when an employee is expected to communicate. Most accommodations for anxiety and depression are low cost, and many require no financial investment at all. The right accommodation depends on the individual and the essential functions of their role.
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Our 2026 research found that 30% of employees requesting a mental health accommodation felt the process took longer than expected, a higher rate than for physical conditions. This often comes down to manager hesitation, inconsistent documentation practices, or uncertainty about what accommodation is appropriate. Centralizing the process in a single system, rather than leaving it to individual managers to interpret case by case, is one of the most effective ways to close that gap.
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Limit information about the request to the people directly involved in evaluating and implementing it. Avoid discussing the reason for an accommodation with a broader team, even informally. AbsenceSoft’s case management tools are built to restrict visibility into sensitive medical details, so the people who need access have it, and no one else does.
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AbsenceSoft gives HR and benefits teams a single system to track every accommodation request, document the interactive process, and apply a consistent standard regardless of the reason for the request. That consistency is especially valuable for mental health accommodations, where our research shows employees are more likely to feel judged, delayed, or unsure whether their request is being taken seriously. A structured, documented process helps protect both the employee experience and your organization’s compliance record.