When exactly should you click for a ticket sale, drop or class registration?

Written 2026-11-01 · Updated 2026-11-01

The goal: arrive just after the opening, by the site's clock

The site accepts clicks from the moment its own clock reaches the opening time. A request that arrives earlier usually gets "not open yet", and by the time you click again others are ahead of you. So the aim is for your request to reach the server just after its clock hits the opening time.

Set the opening time on a site's page here and we work this out for you: how far the site's clock is from standard time, plus the few milliseconds your click takes to reach the server. The big clock shows the site's own time, so you only need to watch for the moment shown.

Check first whether the sale even works this way. Many big sales use a waiting room or a draw, where the opening second matters less (see waiting rooms, draws and first-come sales).

The day before

• Open the site's page here, set the opening date and time, and check the reading.
• Add it to your calendar. The event reminds you 5 minutes before with a link back to the page.
• If friends are trying too, press "Copy link" and send it so you all watch the same clock.
• Have everything ready to paste: course codes, the event link, your seat or size preferences.

30 minutes before

• Open the site's page and leave it open. In the last 30 minutes we re-measure the site every minute, and if its clock changes, the click time updates and the page tells you.
• If a site runs several servers whose clocks disagree, we use the slowest one, so you don't arrive early whichever server you reach.

10 minutes before

• Log in to the site. Not much earlier: some sites end idle sessions after a while.
• Turn on the countdown beeps. Browsers only allow sound after you tap the page once, so tap anywhere on it.

At the opening second

If you wait to *see* the digits change, you're already late: people take about 0.2 s to react to what they see. Click on the rhythm of the beeps instead, so your finger lands with the last, higher beep. The last beep sounds at the click time shown. A couple of practice runs with a different time make it easy.

"Click two or three seconds early"?

The idea is that requests queue up at the opening, so an early click will have waited its way past the opening by the time it's handled. It's a gamble. How long the line is changes every time, and whether a site checks the time when your request arrives or when it gets processed differs from site to site and can't be seen from outside. If the line is shorter than you guessed, you arrive early and get turned away. That's why we leave the queue out of the click time and only add what we can measure.

Part of why the advice varies so much: some sites' clocks really are a second fast or slow. People using a slow site learn that early clicks fail; people using a fast one learn the opposite.

Afterwards

If you had the page open before the opening, we'll ask afterwards how it went: got it, partly or missed, and roughly when you clicked if you want to say. Once enough people answer for the same opening, everyone sees the totals, so the next person has real results to go on.

Check a site's server time

Server time guides

• What is server time? Why a website's clock differs from your phone
  Ticket sales, sneaker drops and class registration open by the website's server clock, not your phone. What server time is, why it can be off, and how to measure it to the millisecond.
• Does internet speed matter when you click at the opening second?
  Is slow Wi-Fi why you missed out? How long your click takes to reach the server, compared with your reaction time and with how far off server clocks can be.
• Waiting rooms, draws and first-come sales: when click timing matters
  Not every sale rewards the fastest click. How first-come sales, virtual waiting rooms and draws decide who gets in, and where the exact server time still helps.