When is the best time to post on TikTok? Is there even such a thing as a "best time?"

In this article, we explore different options for finding your best posting schedule and how to track your analytics for TikTok success.

When Is The Best Time to Post on TikTok?

I know you want to hear there’s a magic posting hour.

I could say 11:24 a.m. EST is the universal launchpad to going viral on TikTok. But that would be silly.

Even if that were somehow true for one particular account, each creator’s audience is unique, and user patterns change as the social media landscape evolves.

So when do you post?

• There’s a best time for you, but this takes time and testing to track as you grow your following and learn how your particular corner of TikTok acts.
• Large-scale analyses have noted some potential trends that can be a good starting template for your schedule.

Read along to learn what the data says about what times, which days, and how often to post — plus how to find your account analytics.

Does It Matter When You Post a TikTok?

Yes... to a degree.

A good rule of thumb to follow on social media is that engagement breeds engagement. On TikTok, the more likes, shares, and comments your video has, the more likely it is to show up on another user’s FYP (which is where you have to be to go viral).

Your video will fare better when the people who will engage with your content — aka your target audience — are most active. And there are times when they are commenting and sharing and times when they aren't, like when they're at work or asleep.

It sounds elementary, but it's important to bear in mind. If your target audience is in a much different time zone than you, you'll need to adjust your posting schedule.

Of course, this isn't the same from one audience to the next, but user activity does ebb and flow throughout a day and a week, and leveraging that can show in your follower count.

Broad TikTok Engagement Trends

General data says… a lot and nothing at all.

When Influencer Marketing Hub analyzed 100,000 posts, they found the following posting times (note: Eastern Standard Time) met peak engagement:

I know. Those times are all over the place. Some trends do emerge, though.

In general, it seems there’s morning traffic and evening traffic Mondays through Wednesdays and more midday activity Thursday through Sunday.

Likewise, social media management platform Hootsuite analyzed 30,000 posts and determined Thursday at 7 p.m. (note: Pacific Standard Time) was The Singular Best Time for engagement. Here’s their daily breakdown:

Digital advertising agency Advertisemint claims that in any particular time zone, mornings between 6-9 a.m. and midday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. are the most reliable windows. They reason that people are active when they’re starting their day and when they’re taking a lunch break.

Social media strategy blog Later, with around 55k followers as of this post, backs up that lunch break model. They determined their particular peak engagement hit reliably around 1 p.m. PST on weekdays, with an extra surge on Thursdays and Fridays.

The Best Time To Post on TikTok Based on Your Location, According to Data Science

Since the “best time to post” varies depending on who you ask, the team here at Kapwing decided to use data science to settle the matter.

We identified the most common publication times of the 15,000 most viewed TikTok videos as of December 2024 using the encoded timestamp in the URLs.

And, rather than indicate a couple of random moments in the day to post, we created a heat map to guide you through the times when recent hit videos were most likely to be published. We also identified separate hotspots for 11 different genres of TikTok, from fitness to small business.

1) Eastern Time Zone

Most of America’s 23 easternmost states get out of bed before the rest of the country, so posts sent at breakfast are likely to land on sleeping phones. Things start to warm up at 11 a.m. EST, with Thursday’s noon-1 p.m. slot the hottest of the week.

However, posting in the early afternoon on the East Coast can also be fruitful— your West Coast viewers are just opening up their phones for their morning coffee break.

• EXPLORE: The best times to post on Instagram

2) Central Time Zone

From Florida up to North Dakota, 20 states are partly or entirely in the Central Time Zone. The clocks here are one hour behind those in the Eastern Time Zone. Most TikTokers here could benefit from posting between 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. towards the beginning of the week.

Post about pets? Note that America’s animal lovers are most likely to indulge in cutesy videos on Saturday mornings, between 9 a.m. and 10 p.m. CST.

3) Mountain Time Zone

The Mountain Time Zone stretches from New Mexico up to Montana through Wyoming and Colorado, taking in part or all of the states contiguous to these. TikToks categorized as small business, beauty, or parenting perform best when posted around midday — every other category fares best through the morning.

However, nearly one-fifth of the top-performing posts are made between noon and 3 p.m. MT, Monday through Sunday, so it’s worth trying this window to see how your audience responds.

• REVEALED: The best times to post on LinkedIn

4) Pacific Time Zone

The Pacific Time Zone takes in all of California and Washington and parts of four other states. Bearing in mind that three USA time zones wake before this one, we found that over 14% of the top-performing TikToks are sent early Monday-Friday between 7 a.m. and 10 a.m. PT — a significant wedge.

Those serving up BookToks and FoodToks have two strong options, depending on how quickly they reach for their phone in the morning. The most successful times for these categories are 9 a.m. and 11 a.m. PT.

What's the Best Day to Post a TikTok?

Data from the above sources suggests there may be some extra heat from Monday to Wednesday.

What's the Worst Time to Post a TikTok?

Based on the above data, you might want to avoid posting late afternoon on Monday and Friday. Or after midnight any day.

What Does TikTok Say The Best Time to Post Is?

TikTok doesn't offer formal assertions on peak engagement time, although Kapwing has compiled detailed research on the 10 proven strategies for growing a TikTok channel.

For engagement, there are two prioritized recommendations:

• Post 1 to 4 times a day to test out your platform and see what works best for you, activity-wise.
• Posting 3 to 5 times a week “has proven to be successful for steady growth.”

When Is Your Personal Best Time to Post a TikTok?

Mysterious as the TikTok algorithm may be, the app isn’t trying to hide your account’s analytics from you. Checking your individual account’s analytics is the best way to pinpoint an optimal posting time for engagement.

On mobile, open the app and navigate to your TikTok profile (in the bottom right-hand corner). Click the icon in the top right corner, click TikTok Studio, then select “View all” next to Analytics.

You'll see info on follower activity, video engagement, where followers found your video, and more.

What Do You Do With TikTok Analytics?

Follow our four tips below to get started with TikTok Analytics:

1. Start by posting frequently and at different times.
2. Track the variation in engagement. Organize relevant data points for yourself — make a spreadsheet, if you like that kind of thing.
3. Act on the patterns in your data (e.g., looks like Tuesday morning gets lots of engagement, so I'll post every Tuesday morning).
4. Come back every month and do this again. Remember that the algorithm updates, user habits evolve, and your audience will grow and change over time.

Now that you know about timing on TikTok, get started on your next video with free resources like Kapwing’s TikTok templates, and remember to write posts with "TikTok SEO'" in mind, strategizing keywords, hashtags, and more.

TikTok Time to Post Data Study Methodology

We analyzed the publication times for the 15,000 most viewed TikTok videos as of December 2024 across 129 hashtags and 11 categories, from fitness to small business.

To source videos for each category, we first curated up to 20 of the most popular hashtags for each category and then pulled a sample of videos for each on the "Top" tab on TikTok.

Having sourced the publication time for each video using the encoded timestamp in the URLs, we found the days and hours overall that were most common among these highly watched videos.