Content may be king, but knowing when’s the best time to post your content on social media sites is the ultimate dealbreaker.

Some studies published by social media management platforms such as Buffer and Falcon.io have shown that there are effective times when to post on social media, but they all have published different results. You can check the compilation of different researches here.

But putting all these research aside, the question is: why is it important to post during the peak times on social media?

Depending on your industry or your target audience, it’s important to post during the peak times because this will guarantee better exposure, higher community engagement and will help curate specific content that will pull in more online people to your business.

Let’s have a closer look on when’s the best time to post quality content on different social channels.

Best Times to Post – Facebook

According to Sprout Social, Facebook still remains as the most dominant social media platform with over 1.7 billion active online users daily.

But given the fact that 93% of marketers are active on this platform, competition is getting tighter and Facebook’s algorithm is changing as well.

Relying on gathered data and inferred insights, these are the most and least effective times to post on Facebook:

• Most effective days: Wednesdays and Thursdays, 1 p.m. – 3 p.m.
• Best day to post for the whole week: Thursday
• Safest times to post during weekdays: 10 a.m. -3 p.m.
• Least amount of engagement in the week: Saturday
• Least amount of engagement in a day: Early mornings and evenings

Digital Tip: Look into your Facebook Insights to determine what kind of audience usually sees and engages with your posts and what time does your posts get the highest views. Adjust your campaign according to the peak times that your target audience is most active online.

Best Times to Post – Instagram

Second to Facebook is Instagram, with over 70% of marketers using IG for business purposes (and is foreseen to grow bigger this year given better opportunities to market to wider audience segmentation).

But it works the same with Facebook’s algroithm: organic posts are the main priority to appear on a user’s personal feed. But don’t worry, businesses can still maximize the most out of Instagram based on these gathered consumer insights:

• Most effective days: Wednesdays at 3 p.m., Thursdays at 5 a.m. or 11 a.m. and 3 p.m. to 4 p.m. and Friday at 5 a.m.
• Best day to post for the whole week: Thursday
• Safest times to post during weekdays: Tuesday to Friday, from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m.
• Least amount of engagement in the week: Sunday

Digital Tip: It’s not necessary if the least engagement is on a weekend. People are always on their phones since weekends are the only time to take a break from work, giving them more time to check out what’s new on social media. It all depends on your target market’s behavior.

Best Time to Post – Twitter

Twitter may be not as socially demanding as the first two social platforms Facebook and IG, but did you know that online users can easily decide whether a certain brand responds fast and engages well? That’s because Twitter is known for real-time news, updates reviews and even forums or social media listening tool.

The key to nailing content marketing on Twitter is finding out how to get to your target market’s good side by listening, engaging and publishing during the right times.

Here’s Sprout Social’s gathered insights:

• Most effective days: Friday, 9-10 a.m.
• Best day to post for the whole week: Friday
• Safest times to post during weekdays: from 10 a.m. to noon
• Least amount of engagement in the week: Sunday mornings

Digital Tip: Try experimenting on posting during Saturday mornings, since 9 a.m and 10 a.m. are also the highest times of engagement for brands.

Best Time to Post – LinkedIn

LinkedIn has been expanding its marketing opportunities for businesses and even professionals thanks to LinkedIn InMail and Sponsored Ads.

Ideally, the best time to post on LinkedIn is before and after people’s working time or during breaktime.

• Most effective days: Tuesdays and Thursdays, 7-8 a.m., 12 noon or 5 p.m. – 6 p.m.
• Best day to post for the whole week: Thursday
• Least amount of engagement in the week: Monday, Friday and Weekends (it varies)

Digital Tip: People tend to use LinkedIn for professional development, so there might be a chance that your ads will be ignored if you do sponsored ads frequently. Don’t be too heavy on the advertisements in LinkedIn and instead, invest them on other social media channels.