Best Time to Post on Social Media for Your Business

Social media marketing tools are not always cheap. Pinpointing the best time to post on social media will ensure you get as many eyes as possible on your content, and make all the time and money you put into worth it.

To help you with this, we’ve researched the best time to post on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube and X to get the maximum amount of engagement on your posts from your followers.

The Best Time to Post on Different Social Media Platforms

We have conducted extensive research and utilized our expertise to develop a rough guide that outlines the optimal times for catching active users on various social media platforms. As you can see from the guide, the peak times are generally in the morning on weekdays, and don’t vary too much by platform, with the exception of TikTok and YouTube, where peak use hours are generally in the afternoon.

If you want to gain more engagement on Instagram and Facebook, it’s better to post earlier in the day, especially at the beginning of the week.

If you want to increase your engagement on X or LinkedIn, then it’s advisable to focus on posting during the working week vs. the weekend because it’s when activity is at its peak. For a detailed analysis of our findings, please read on.

Best Time to Post on Facebook

Number of users worldwide: 3.07 billion

When it comes to the best time to post on Facebook in 2024, we noticed pretty steady popularity for 9 – 11 AM for peak browsing times on the platform throughout the working week.

Once the weekend rolls around, Facebook users are easiest to reach between 8 – 9 AM on Saturdays and a little later on Sunday mornings, at 10 AM. That said, users are most active during the week, overall.

Best Time to Post on YouTube

Number of users worldwide: 2.5 billion

YouTube is the second most popular social media platform after Facebook, but its users are on there at very different times.

From Monday to Friday, we learned that the best time to post is the middle of the afternoon, between 2 – 4 PM. On the other hand, when the weekend arrives, users are more active on YouTube in the morning. This means your videos can attract more engagement if posted between 9 – 11 AM.

While YouTube follows a rather different speed than the other social media platforms, posting time can still be worked to your advantage. We see a little less variation across the days of the week and more so a discrepancy between the ideal times to post on weekdays vs. the weekends.

Best Time to Post on Instagram

Number of users worldwide: 2 billion

We found that scheduling your social media marketing posts for earlier in the day scores a higher engagement rate. The best time to post on Instagram on Mondays and Tuesdays is between 9 AM and 12 PM, according to our research. This is because it’s the start of the workweek, so people are more focused on their day-to-day tasks, and may be more likely to check social media first thing, rather than throughout the day as they get into deeper work.

If you want to be sure to catch those earlier users, it’s wise to schedule your posts with a social media marketing tool such as Zoho Social or HubSpot. That way you can post even without being online yourself. With these platforms, you can also access important insights into your social media performance, to help fine-tune the best times to post according to your engagement.

As we move further into the week and attention spans wane, audiences are looking to Instagram as a distraction. Wednesday’s audiences peak at 9 AM, 11 AM and 4 PM, while your best bet on Thursdays is 2 PM.

You can reach your audiences either on Friday mornings between 10 AM and 12 PM, or again at 5-6 PM.

As we arrive at the weekend, usage drops, although Saturday morning seems to be a peak time for scrolling, while Sunday’s audiences rise a little later between 10 – 11 AM.

Best Time to Post on TikTok

Number of users worldwide: 1.6 billion

Since TikTok users tend to skew younger compared to other social media platforms, the best time to post on TikTok is less dictated by the 9-5 workweek. Statistically, over 76% of US 18 to 24-year-olds and 70% of teenagers were on TikTok in 2023. This means that the best time to post may align with the daily schedule of a student, rather than a full-time worker.

Between 4-5 PM seems to be the sweet spot on most days, but, users also on the platform in the mornings, between 9 -10 AM Wednesday through Saturday.

Best Time to Post on LinkedIn

Number of users worldwide: 1 billion

As LinkedIn is made for networking, it makes sense that the best time to catch users on the platform is during regular business hours.

• You will notice that users are predominantly active on LinkedIn during the mid-morning, with a total lack of engagement during weekday evenings. Since Monday mornings are usually spent catching up on important matters, 11 AM is a better option to catch busy professionals looking for a mid-morning break.

Activity drops significantly on the weekends, but you can still catch some people who are too busy to visit LinkedIn during the week. 10 AM on Saturdays and Sundays has been deemed the golden hour, but again, engagement is much lower at these times than it is on weekday mornings.

Best Time to Post on X

Number of users worldwide: 500 million

X (formerly Twitter) has seen a drop in engagement since Elon Musk took over in 2022, but it’s still home to some 500 million users.

Interestingly enough,  X seems to have crept into the territory of a social media app predominantly used during the working week, much like LinkedIn. Businesses especially will not see much engagement from posting on X throughout the weekend, so we’d recommend focusing your efforts on other platforms during that time.

During the working week, you’ll see the most engagement on X throughout the morning (9 – 11 AM). That peak time gets later on Fridays, with the most active users at noon. This tails off throughout the afternoon as users put away their phones for the weekend.

How to Find the Best Time to Post on Social Media

While we’ve given you the average best times to post on different social media platforms based on available data, this can vary a lot depending on the audience you’re trying to reach.

Here’s how you can pinpoint the best times for your business to post:

1. Know your target audience: the age range of your target audience can give you a good idea of when they’re most likely to be active, and what social media platforms they use most. As we’ve seen, TikTok is popular with a younger audience that’s active later in the day, while Instagram and Facebook skew older (30s-40s) with users most active in the morning.
2. Look at when your best-performing posts were posted: learning from your successes (and mistakes) is another way to optimize posting. It could be that your best posts performed well because of their great content, but when they were posted probably also had a lot to do with it. Do your 10 AM Facebook posts typically do great, while your weekend posts don’t? If so, you might want to refocus your posting.
3. Be aware of time zones:  your target audience might be in a different time zone than you, and if that’s the case, schedule your post according to their time zone, not yours. For example, if your East Coast-based business wants to reach Californians on Instagram, don’t post at 9 AM EST when they’re all still asleep.
4. Keep on top of trends: social media platforms are constantly evolving, and so do the habits of their users. Keeping up to date with the latest trend data will make sure your business doesn’t get left behind.

Specialized social media management tools like Hubspot and Zoho Social can make narrowing down your audience’s habits easier, so if you’ve got room in your budget, we’d recommend you use them.

How can I monitor social media engagement?

There are several engagement metrics you can check on social media to assess the success of your posts, including views, likes, comments and shares. These native metrics can usually be found within your social media account, as long as it’s a business account.

To gain a greater insight into your performance and understand areas of improvement, you can use a third-party tool such as HubSpot, which compiles data from several platforms into one easily digestible interface.

Why Does the Time You Post on Social Media Matter?

Posting at the right times matters for businesses on social media because it can directly impact engagement and visibility with their target audiences. Here are some of the key reasons:

1. Reach More Prospects: Posting content when your audience is most active on social media platforms means more of your target customer base will see your posts and content in their feeds. More visibility yields more potential engagement.
2. Drive Sales: Higher post visibility and engagement can translate directly into more site traffic, online sales, and conversions.
3. Compete With Others: Just as you aim for high visibility times, you’re competitors are doing the same. Posting first means your brand content may show up higher in feeds and attract more engagement overall.
4. Build Trust With Followers: You’re more likely to generate comments, shares, and beneficial interactions that show you’re listening if followers see your posts immediately or while the discussion is hot around your industry.
5. Understand Demand: Paying close attention to when engagement spikes and dips can reveal new opportunities for content that caters to your audience’s real-time interests.

Because social media moves quickly, when you post is crucial for making the most of your marketing efforts. Analyzing the best times to post for engagement helps convert interested audiences into paying customers.

How Often Should I Post on Social Media?

How often you should post on social media really depends on the platform:

• LinkedIn: one to three times a week at most. Posts should be longer and less frequent, but carefully crafted.
• Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok: For regular feed posts, between two to five times a week. However, we recommend posting daily on Instagram and Facebook stories.
• YouTube: Twice a week for shorter videos (10-15 minutes), or twice a month for long-form videos (over 30 minutes).
• X (formerly Twitter): Daily if you can, since X favors very short, snappy posts.

Remember, to grow your audience quickly, it’s important to post consistently at specific times and days. The frequency and length of your posts should vary depending on the social media platform you’re using.

While these rules are a good guide, social media is not an exact science. If a new viral trend explodes or some enormous news comes out that would provide an excellent opportunity to create an engaging post, you shouldn’t avoid it simply on the basis that you’ve posted too many times that week.

How long does posting on social media take?

While the act itself of hitting ‘post’ on social media takes a matter of seconds, the whole content planning arc takes a lot longer. It can take anywhere from a few days to several months, depending on how elaborate your campaign is.

For example, creating a quick graphic based on information you already have in your database, writing a caption, and posting it should take only an hour or so. But, executing a photoshoot and editing photos to post on Instagram, or compiling a research document to showcase on LinkedIn can take weeks to a month (again, depending on the scale of the campaign).

You need to take into consideration the ideation phase of a content plan, creating the content itself and then the actual posting.

To make matters easier, you can hire a dedicated social media manager or employ the use of a social media management tool. These tools allow you to easily create a content plan, schedule posts even when you’re not online and access performance metrics.