Vacation in ER

There are some slower times in the stock market that may be more conducive to longer vacations. End of August and late December are primary examples. You may also get away with the second half of May and September sometimes.

You should be good any time outside of earnings season, August and December are the best time because allot of your clients will also be on vacation 

Never take vacation bro. If you wanna be II ranked you stay in the office at all times. Source - I work for an II ranked analyst

Usually aligns with when your senior analyst is not on vacation. So parts of December / August may not work and you may be shifted into more random “down times” for your sector I.e. mid July between preview and earnings actually starting. 

I personally find it very hard to take extended vacations. A day or two here and there is how I do it. My analyst will never say no and always encourages it but given ER are such small teams, if something happens with one of your names/coverage space you, kind of need to be there.

End of August and December

I always bring my laptop with me just in case my Analyst needs anything though.

Would also add that after 3 years in research, no issue taking a week long vacation at any point. 

DustOff

I'm joining a SS ER team out of undergrad and was wondering how people take vacation days at junior level. 
 

I know in banking, things tend to slow down toward end of year, where most people prob do WFH or simply have nothing to do, so they mix their vacation days there. But my thought is that as long as markets open, it is tougher for us to take days off. Especially I'm not from US, and if I want to go back home visiting family, I'd probably need a longer days than others.

Would appreciate any thoughts.

Very much so depends on the analyst in my experience. If you're looking for windows, 1st/2nd week of July (After II but before EPS), end of August, and the holidays are best. 

Echo the above (Aug/Dec), but as others stated this is highly analyst/team/coverage dependent... smaller team or hardo MD and you will more than likely be stuck taking the occasional long weekend as opposed to a true vacation.