How to find Best Time to Post on LinkedIn for your audience

Why Most LinkedIn 'Best Time to Post' Advice is Wrong (And How to Find YOUR Optimal Times)

"Post on Tuesday at 10 AM for maximum engagement."

"Thursday between 9 AM and 1 PM is your golden window."

"Avoid weekends at all costs."

If you've searched for the best times to post on LinkedIn, you've seen these recommendations everywhere. Buffer analyzed 1 million posts. Sprout Social looked at 2.5 billion engagements. HubSpot, Hootsuite, and dozens of other platforms all share similar findings, with images like the one below:

But the problem is: following their "universal" timing advice might actually be hurting your LinkedIn performance.

In reality, there is NO "universal" best time to post on LinkedIn, and even on an individual LinkedIn profile basis, the time can actually ... change over time. I say that based on my own as well as 11 other people's profiles that I've analyzed manually, and thousands of influencers profiles' (including Ken Cheng, Justin Welsh, Adam Robinson, Jasmin Alic, etc.) that I analyzed via LiGo Analytics for LinkedIn. I'll share screenshots to back all of my claims below - don't worry.

In short, the sooner you stop following generic advice, the sooner you'll see actual results.

If you're in a hurry to get the answer:

I've shared how you can find the "best time to post and the best day to post on LinkedIn" for your specific audience towards the end (or you can find it from the table of contents).

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The Fatal Flaw in "Best Time to Post" Studies

Every major study on LinkedIn posting times follows the same methodology:

1. Analyze "millions" of LinkedIn posts from their user base
2. Calculate average engagement rates by day and time
3. Declare the highest-performing slots as "best times"
4. Package it into an infographic with confidence

The problem with this is kind of obvious .. but I'm guessing the articles were written by ghostwriters and no "Data Scientist" was involved in the process, because they'd have told them after just a very quick look: "Sir, you need to kindly take out the anomalies, the influencers (with or without engagement pods), and the viral posts" to get values that might ACTUALLY be close to a 'universal best time to post on LinkedIn' for organic posts.

They're averaging out completely different audiences into meaningless generalizations.

Think about it this way: America has the hustle culture, Europe has a bit more work life balance, Asia is ... well, depends on the country. Do you seriously expect that the "global" 8AM Tuesday would be the best time to post for everyone? I didn't buy it and went deep to find out what is.

Let me now show you a few examples, starting with influencers and then we will move towards "non-influential" people (whose posts aren't "bound" to go viral regardless of when they post):

Analyzing Influencers Best Time to Post

I did a deeper analysis of this in my LinkedIn post in case you want to see (it includes Tom Hunt, Ken Cheng, Justin Welsh & Jasmin Alic).

1. Justin Welsh (750K+ followers)

Best Days: Monday, Tuesday & Wednesday; the engagement is almost the same on each day percentage wise.

Best Times: 6AM to 8AM (his time, i.e. EST).

Location: USA.

Analysis Range: Last 30 days.

Justin Welsh is arguably the biggest influencer in the "LinkedIn coaches" segment - his audience is "global". Do you think your LinkedIn audience that is confined to the UK would be active at the same time and days as that?

You'll know the answer to that by the end of the article.

Before we start analyzing the best time to post on LinkedIn for "the average founders" that constitue 99% of LinkedIn (myself included), lets first look at another influencer in the SAME niche (LinkedIn coach/consultant) but from a different region: Europe.

2. Jasmin Alic (310K+ followers)

Best Days: All days get the same level of engagement roughly (percentage wise).

Best Times: 12PM to 2PM (his time, i.e. CET); but he only seems to post at that time, likely after a lot of "experimentation" with different times.

Location: Europe (Bosnia and Herzegovina).

Analysis Range: Last 365 days.

Trend/Conclusion: You can already see. Two influencers in the same niche just in different countries, and their "best days and times" are completely different. And yet ... ghostwriters will upload images like the one below and say: "Hmm, this is the universal best day and time to post for everyone".

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Why Your Audience Timing is Unique (With Real Examples)

Through LiGo's advanced LinkedIn analytics, we've analyzed 1000+ profiles of people from different professional backgrounds, positions/roles, goals & objectives (for being on LinkedIn), and locations.

Some of the key questions that cause a HUGE variation in the best day and time for individuals and that you should ask yourself are:

1. Are you selling a product, a service, or a course?
2. Are you doing B2B, B2C, D2C, or just generally building thought leadership?
3. The above two help in deciding: Is your audience confined to a specific location? Be it a city, a state, a continent. Or is it global?
4. What does the "day to day" routine of your ICP look like? What days, and times are they using LinkedIn most of the times?

The problem is that: you can very easily answer the first 3 questions. But the fourth one is literally always going to be a guess .. unless you analyze your OWN LinkedIn posts, and their past performance history.

LiGo's analytics can help with that (and a lot more, you can view the "Complete LinkedIn Analytics breakdown for Justin Welsh's profile here), but I'll come back to it later, we've got a very important section to cover, which is what is the best time to post on LinkedIn for a regular founder, agency owners, professional, consultant that does not have 100K+ followers.

I'll share with you two examples for that too, and they will prove that "what works for others will very likely not work for you".

Analyzing The Best Time to Post on LinkedIn For Average LinkedIn users (<100K followers)

I'll show two examples here, both of whom I've spoken to and observed for a long while and know that they've grown organically.

First one has 66K followers, the other one has 2K followers. So, it should give us a "good contrast" to get a complete picture.

1. Alexander Willard (2.4K followers)

Best Days: All days get the same level of engagement, I wouldn't call any of them the "best day to post" (percentage wise).

Best Times: 9PM to 11PM (his time, i.e. BST); could be skewed due to one or two posts in that time range going viral, since engagement average seems consistent regardless of the time.

Location: UK.

Analysis Range: Last 365 days.

2. Maja Voje (66K followers)

Best Days: Sunday is the absolute winner, rest of the days get more or less the same level of engagement.

Best Times: 2PM to 6PM (her time, i.e. CET).

Location: Europe (Bosnia and Herzegovina).

Analysis Range: Last 365 days.

Here's the rewritten section focusing on actionable value and our core message:

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How to Find the Best Time to Post on LinkedIn For Your LinkedIn Profile

There are two ways. One is automated and would take 1 minute, the other is a bit more manual (and better suited for those that have not made any posts on LinkedIn in the past, but are "planning" to do so):

Option 1: The Automated Approach (Recommended)

Use LiGo's LinkedIn Analytics:

1. Connect your LinkedIn profile to LiGo's analytics platform
2. Analyze your historical data - we'll examine your last 30-365 days of posts
3. Get personalized insights showing exactly when YOUR audience engages most
4. See detailed breakdowns by day, time, content type, and engagement quality

This gives you the same level of detailed analysis you've seen throughout this article - but for your specific account. You'll also discover which content themes resonate most with your audience and when different post types perform best.

Bonus Points: You won't just get the "best day and times to post on LinkedIn" you will also get the below insights for your account:

1. You can also see how "consistent" you've been, as well as the engagement rate per post for the last 30 days, 90 days, 180 days, 365 days and all time.
2. The fluctuation in engagement per post over time.
3. Ability to chat with your LinkedIn data (imagine ChatGPT had access to your public LinkedIn data like posts, headline, bio, experiences, etc.); you can ask it anything like "suggest me a new bio based on my last 10 posts", "how can improve my tagline so that it better conveys my products value proposition", etc.

And lastly, AI will instantly tell you some high level insights like the ones below:

Option 2: The Manual Approach (If You Prefer DIY)

The LinkedIn Native Method:

LinkedIn's post timestamps only show relative times ("2d ago", "1w ago"), making historical analysis nearly impossible. However, if you want to try:

1. Scroll through your recent posts (last 2-3 weeks maximum)
2. Note which posts have highest engagement rates (not just total engagement)
3. Try to correlate with posting times - though precision will be limited

The Fresh Start Method:

If you haven't been posting consistently, start tracking from now:

1. Create a simple spreadsheet with columns for:
   • Post date and time
   • Content type and theme
   • Engagement metrics after 24/48 hours
2. Post consistently for 4-6 weeks across different times and days
3. Calculate engagement rates (reactions + comments ÷ impressions)
4. Identify patterns and optimize based on your data

The Educated Guess Approach (For Beginners)

If you're just starting out and have no posting history, make informed guesses based on your audience:

Observe Your Professional Network:

• When do your colleagues check LinkedIn? During coffee breaks? Lunch? Evening commute?
• What are your industry's typical work patterns? Client-heavy mornings? Meeting-free lunch hours?
• When do you naturally think about professional development? Many people reflect on weekends or early mornings.

Start with industry-specific patterns from this article, then quickly move to data-driven optimization as you build posting history.

Why the Automated Approach Wins

The problem with manual tracking: LinkedIn's limited timestamp visibility makes historical analysis extremely difficult. You're essentially starting from scratch every time.

The advantage of analytics platforms: Tools like LiGo can process months or years of your posting data instantly, revealing patterns you'd never catch manually.

The time factor: Manual tracking takes months to generate actionable insights. Analytics platforms give you answers immediately based on your existing posting history.

Pro tip: Even if you prefer the manual approach, use an analytics platform first to establish your baseline, then track changes over time manually if desired.

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TLDR; The goal isn't to follow someone else's posting schedule - it's to discover when YOUR specific audience is most ready to engage with YOUR unique content.