Last modified July 18, 2021
In 2019, Facebook changed its News Feed algorithm to prioritize posts that have meaningful interactions, especially from family and friends, over content from brands. Since then, brand publishers on the platform have found it more difficult than before to get their organic content in front of their customers without using Facebook ads to boost their content.
Beyond creating high-quality content, one of the most effective tactics for hacking the algorithm is making sure you post at the right time. But when is the best time to post on Facebook? Consider yourself lucky, because this is what I’m going to cover in more detail in this article.
The best time to post on Facebook
Buffer analyzed 43 million Facebook posts from the top 20,000 brands last year and found that Facebook’s organic engagement fell by more than 50% in 18 months. And since Facebook favors more content from family and friends, brands generally need to have a Facebook advertising strategy to increase their reach. But what is the alternative to putting ads on Facebook? There’s a bit of hacking involved, which is posting at the right time to reach your audience.
As with most things in life, there is no easy answer when it comes to the best times to post on Facebook. Many studies have been carried out on the subject, and they all come to different results.
Sprout Social was able to draw some general conclusions from a survey of its customers’ posts on Facebook. They expressed all their times according to the Central Time Zone (CST). You can achieve similar results if you use the same time zone as most of your target market.
The main findings from Sprout Social are:
- The best posting times are Wednesdays at 11 a.m. and 1 p.m.
- The best day is Wednesday
- You’ll get the most consistent engagement during the week, from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m.
- The worst day is Sunday, where engagement is the lowest.
- It’s early morning and evening, before 7 a.m. and after 5 p.m., that you’ll find the least engagement on each cheek
People are most likely to see your Facebook posts mid-week, from mid-morning to mid-afternoon. Many people probably check their Facebook apps during morning tea break, lunch and afternoon.
It depends on your target audience
CoSchedule took a slightly different approach. They gathered results from 25 studies to look for patterns for the best times to post on Facebook across various industries. And they found significant variations in Facebook usage, depending on industry. However, many of them confirmed SproutSocial’s results.
- Hootsuite suggests posting between noon and 3 p.m. weekdays
- With a slight variation, Hubspot says 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. is generally best
- Likewise, Falcon.io suggested that most engagements take place from noon to 4 p.m.
- Unmetric keeps things moving between 9 a.m. and 2 p.m.
- TrackMaven disagrees, suggesting 8 p.m. on Thursday is the best time
However, one thing stands out clearly. Different people use Facebook in different ways, and it’s best to use more precise methods to find the optimal time for your Facebook audience.
It depends on your industry and sector
According to the CoSchedule team, the following periods and ranges seem to see the most activity:
- For B2C: 9 a.m. to 10 p.m., 12 p.m. to 1 p.m., 4 p.m. to 5 p.m.
- For B2B: 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. being best.
- For software services: 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., then it is dropped off. 9am, 3pm and 5pm are best.
- For health and well-being: 6 a.m. to 7 a.m., 9 a.m., 11 a.m. – noon.
- For the media: 7 a.m., 11 a.m., 6 p.m.
- To post on Facebook for Higher Education: 8 a.m., noon, 3 p.m.
Sprout Social is also looking at a few other sectors, including Best Day:
- For consumer goods: Wednesday at 1 p.m. and Friday at 11 a.m.
- For the media: Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday at 5 a.m., Friday from 8-9 a.m.
- For education: Wednesday at 9 a.m. and Saturday at 5 a.m.
- For a non-profit organization: Wednesday and Friday at 8-9 a.m.
- For a technology company: Wednesday from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m.
For health: Wednesday from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. - For the financial sector: Wednesday at 12 p.m.
For travel and leisure: Tuesday at 2 p.m., Wednesday at 1 p.m. and Friday at 11 a.m.
Find your best moment with Audience Insights
One way to find the best time to post to your own social audience is to use Facebook’s Audience Insights feature. You can access your insights by clicking the appropriate link at the top of your page. You want to see when your Facebook fans are online. You can do this by clicking on Posts in the left menu. This will give you a breakdown of when your fans are online, both by day and by hour.
Look for spikes in the data, showing times when your Facebook audience is most active.
Facebook Insights also shows you data about your most successful posts. Then simply take note of the posts that show the most engagement. This way you can see when they were published. You might consider posting more often at the same times.
Passionate about the web and entrepreneurship, I founded Digitiz in 2016. My goal is to pass on my experience to you and to be able to save you time in choosing your tools.
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