Search for the best time to post on social media and you’ll find dozens of confident charts, each with a different answer. The honest truth is that the best time depends on your audience, your content and the network — and the only data that can tell you is your own. This guide shows you how to find your own best posting times, test them properly and keep them up to date.
Why generic “best time to post” charts mislead
Generic charts aren’t useless, but they answer a different question from yours. Here’s why they rarely transfer to your account:
- They describe someone else’s audience. A chart built from thousands of brands averages B2B software firms, fashion labels and local restaurants together. A bakery’s followers don’t keep the same hours as a software buyer’s.
- Time zones get flattened. If your followers are spread across regions, “Tuesday at 9am” means very different things to different people.
- Averages hide the spread. A slot can top an average while being mediocre for most of the accounts in the sample.
- Everyone reads the same chart. If thousands of accounts post at the “best” time, that slot becomes the most crowded.
- Feeds are ranked, not just chronological. On most networks today, what people see is shaped by ranking as well as recency, so the hour you publish is one factor among several — content quality and early engagement matter too.
Use a generic chart, if at all, as a starting guess. Then replace it with evidence from your own posts.
What “best time” should mean for your account
Before you look at any data, decide what “best” means. Different goals point to different slots:
- Reach or impressions — when you want as many people as possible to see the post.
- Engagement rate — when you want likes, comments, shares and saves relative to reach.
- Clicks — when the post exists to send people to a page or an order form.
- Conversations — when you want replies and DMs your team can actually answer.
That last one is easy to forget. A post that sparks questions at 22:00, when nobody is around to reply, may do worse for your business than one that lands while your team is online.
How to read your own engagement data
You don’t need a data team for this. You need enough posts, a fair metric and a simple way of grouping them.
Use enough posts
One viral post can skew everything. Look at a period long enough to include a good number of posts per network — for many small accounts, the last two or three months is a sensible window. If you post rarely, look further back or start a deliberate test (see below).
Compare rates, not raw counts
A post that reached more people will naturally collect more likes. Compare engagement rate (engagements divided by reach or impressions) so posts with different reach can be compared fairly.
Group posts into time bands
Single minutes are noise. Group posts by weekday and by one- or two-hour bands — for example “Thursday 10:00–11:00” — and compare the average rate for each band.
Keep content types apart
Reels, carousels, Stories and text posts behave differently. If all your videos went out on Fridays, Friday will look better for reasons that have nothing to do with timing. Compare like with like.
Here is what a simple summary might look like. The numbers below are hypothetical, for illustration only:
| Time band | Posts | Avg. engagement rate |
|---|---|---|
| Tue 08:00–09:00 | 6 | 3.1% |
| Thu 10:00–11:00 | 7 | 5.4% |
| Sat 18:00–19:00 | 5 | 3.8% |
| Sun 12:00–13:00 | 4 | 4.2% |
With small numbers like these, treat the result as a lead to test, not a rule.
In Open Motives, the analytics overview brings every connected channel into one place, and AI insights point out patterns while citing the numbers they’re based on, so you can check the claim rather than take it on trust.
Test posting slots with a queue
Looking backwards only gets you so far, because your past posts weren’t designed as an experiment. A short, deliberate test gives you cleaner answers.
- Pick three or four candidate slots per network, based on your data or a reasonable guess.
- Set them up as posting slots and fill them from a queue, so posts land in the slots automatically instead of whenever someone remembers.
- Keep the content mix steady. Rotate similar post types through each slot so the slot, not the format, is what changes.
- Run it for four to six weeks. Long enough to smooth out one-off events.
- Compare engagement rate per slot, using the same metric you chose above.
- Keep the winners, swap out the losers, and test one new slot next round.
Open Motives publishing supports queues and posting slots, recurring posts and drag-to-reschedule on the calendar, so you can run a test like this without rebuilding your plan each week.
Per-network differences to account for
The same audience can behave differently on each network, so test each one separately rather than copying one schedule everywhere. Some things worth considering as you plan your tests:
Instagram and Facebook
Ranked feeds mean early engagement can help a post travel. That makes it worth testing slots when your own followers are most likely to be scrolling — and when your team is around to reply to the first comments. Reels and feed posts may have different best times, so track them separately. See the Instagram channel page for what you can publish and manage from Open Motives.
For many people LinkedIn is a work network, so it’s worth testing workday slots against evenings rather than assuming. B2B audiences and job seekers can behave quite differently. More on the LinkedIn channel page.
TikTok and YouTube
Video on these platforms can keep finding viewers well after it’s published, so the publish hour may matter less than the first few seconds of the video. Timing still helps with early momentum, but test it with that in mind.
X, Threads and Bluesky
These feeds tend to move quickly, so posts can lose visibility sooner. Timing may matter more here, and posting around moments your audience already cares about can help.
Treat all of these as hypotheses for your tests, not rules. Your own data wins.
Example: how Kettle & Co. found Thursday 10:30
Kettle & Co. is the small bakery we use as a running example in Open Motives. Their posts cover cardamom buns, the weekly menu and Riverside deliveries.
Looking at the last 30 days in analytics, an AI insight flagged that Thursday 10:00–11:00 had the highest engagement and suggested a next step: plan two Reels a week in the Thursday slot. It suited the business, too: mid-morning is when the team is in the shop and can answer comments quickly.
So when they wrote the autumn menu post — “cardamom buns are back from Thursday” — the composer suggested Thursday 10:30 as the best time, and they scheduled it to Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn and X from one draft. The Thursday slot then became a fixed posting slot in their queue, and they keep testing a second slot against it.
The point isn’t that Thursday at 10:30 is right for you. It’s that the answer came from their own followers, was checked against the numbers, and is still being tested.
Keep your best times up to date
Audiences change. Seasons change. A slot that worked in summer may not work in December. Build a light routine:
- Monthly: glance at engagement rate by time band for each network.
- Quarterly: run a fresh slot test on your main network.
- After big changes — a new audience, a new format, a new region — start a new test rather than trusting old data.
Frequently asked questions
Is there a universal best time to post on social media?
No. The best time depends on your audience, content type and network. Generic charts can be a starting guess, but your own engagement data is the only reliable guide.
How many posts do I need before my data is reliable?
There’s no magic number, but a few posts per time band is the minimum before you read anything into it. If you post rarely, run a four- to six-week slot test to collect cleaner data.
Should I post at the same time on every network?
Not necessarily. People use each network differently, so test slots per network and per content type. A single draft can still go out to several networks at different times.
Does posting time still matter if feeds are ranked?
Yes, but it’s one factor among several. Posting when your followers are active can help early engagement, which ranked feeds tend to reward — but strong content matters more than a perfect minute.
Conclusion
Forget the universal best time. Decide what “best” means for you, read your own engagement rate by time band, run a short slot test with a queue, and repeat each season. You’ll end up with a schedule built on your followers, not someone else’s.
If you’d like to try it on your own accounts, see plans and pricing — the Free plan needs no credit card.