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When to Post on HN: Analyzed 23k posts(June 2025)
Conventional wisdom says: Post Tuesday morning for max traffic. Data says: That’s wrong. (at least, in June 2025)
1. Best Time of Day
Post between midnight–1AM → 2x more comments than average, yet only 2% of posts are made then.
Avg votes: 25.7 (vs 18 overall)
Avg comments: 20 (vs 10 overall)
Other high-performing time slots:
Votes: 4AM, 7AM, 8–10PM, 10PM+ → Avg votes > 20
Comments: 9PM, 11PM → Avg comments > 11
2. Best Day of Week
Upvotes: Saturday/Sunday → Avg votes > 19
Comments: Sunday/Monday → Avg comments > 10
But beware:
18%+ of posts happen on Monday → high competition
Sunday has lower competition, yet performs well—easiest day to hit the front page with the same vote count.
TL;DR
For the best shot at visibility:
Post Sunday, between midnight and 1AM.
See link for full data analysis
- hele486 1y agoPST??
- sophianara 1y agoYes!
- WalterGR 1y agoIt’s PDT not PST. Pacific Time Zone: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Time_Zone https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pacific_Time_Zone Yes, colloquially, people use “PST” when they mean “PT” - but if we can’t split hairs here, then where?? :)
- sophianara 1y agoFair enough — PDT it is! Thanks for the precision... and the follicular finesse!
- mardesay 1y agoYou should’ve sprinted in 15 minutes earlier—your own research called it!
- sophianara 1y agoLike most things—way easier said than done
- ofalkaed 1y agoMidnight-1AM also seems to be peak time for creating accounts so you can reply to your own submissions.
- treetalker 1y ago> See link for full data analysis Link is missing.
- sophianara 1y agooops! thank you