Classroom Timer

Classroom timer ideas

A visible timer takes the nagging out of pacing: here are six ways teachers use this page, from a 2-minute transition to a full stations rotation.

• Transitions: A 2-minute timer on the board turns packing up or moving seats into a race against the circle, not against you.
• Think-pair-share: One minute to think, two to talk in pairs, then share: chain the three steps so the bell does the pacing.
• Clean-up: Five minutes, the Bell tone and the activity name on screen; the room is tidy when the ring is empty.
• Tests and quizzes: Set the full length, go full screen, and the amber and red bands give a silent warning without you calling the time.
• Centres and stations: A chain of equal steps, one per rotation, with the tone between them; the next station's name shows under the timer.
• Brain breaks: A 3-minute timer with the Gentle tone for stretching or quiet time, then straight back to the lesson.

Teaching from Canva slides? Spin Wheel Maker puts a clickable spin wheel inside the design itself, so when the timer ends the class watches the next name land on your slide: try Spin Wheel Maker in Canva. Need groups for the activity, a quick yes or no, or a letter for the warm-up? Split the class with the Random Team Generator, spin the Yes or No Wheel or draw one with the Random Letter Generator.

Pomodoro timer

The Pomodoro technique is a focus method: work on one task for 25 minutes, rest for 5, and after 4 of those sessions take a longer 15-minute break. The fixed rhythm removes the decision of when to stop, which is what makes it work for marking, lesson planning, revision and homework.

The Pomodoro tab runs that cycle for you. It shows the current phase (Focus, Short break or Long break) and "Session 2 of 4", plays the end tone between phases and, with Auto-start on (the default), moves to the next phase by itself. All three lengths are editable, so a class can run 15/3/10 while an adult revises on 50/10/20.

A counter of focus sessions completed today sits under the timer and resets at local midnight (or when you press Reset count), so a study afternoon or a revision week has a visible tally without an account.

Looking for the Pomodoro timer directly? /tools/pomodoro-timer opens this page on the Pomodoro tab.

Run your daily routine in one tap

A routine is the block you run every morning, saved once and started with one tap: for example morning work 15 minutes, four centers of 12 minutes with a 1-minute switch, then clean-up 5 minutes. The Routine tab ships with 3 starters (Morning block, Centers x4, Test with breaks) that you can edit or delete, and on your next visit a "Welcome back" card above the timer starts the routine you ran last, with a small Mon–Fri row of the days it ran this week.

The Centers rotation helper builds the steps for you: pick 2 to 8 stations, the minutes per station and a switch time (none, 30 seconds, 1 minute or 2 minutes), optionally name the stations and groups, and it adds "Centers 1 of 4", "Switch", "Centers 2 of 4" and so on. While it runs, an Up next strip shows the next two steps with their lengths, and a Group → Station table moves every group on by one each round, large enough to read from the back of the room in full screen.

Share a routine with a teaching partner, a para or a sub: Share routine makes a link (or a QR code to scan, or a routine card picture for a teacher group) that opens a read-only copy with Use this routine and Make your own routine. The routine lives only in the part of the link after the #, which browsers never send to a server. A follow-along link also carries when the current step ends, so a second screen, a station tablet or a student Chromebook shows the same countdown from its own clock.

Splitting the class into center groups first? Make fair groups with the Random Team Generator or seat them with the Seating Chart Maker.

Chained timers and presets

Chained timers run a lesson plan as one sequence: on the Routine tab build steps such as "Warm-up 5 min → Group work 15 min → Share 5 min" (minutes and seconds per step), press Run routine, and each step starts when the previous one ends, with the end tone between them and "Step 2 of 3 · Group work" plus the next step's name on screen. Skip step jumps ahead when the class is quicker than planned; Restart chain begins again.

Presets are how you reuse all this. Save the current length, activity name and tone under a name ("Reading 10 minutes"), or save a chain, and start it from the Presets tab with one tap next lesson; edit, reorder or delete any of them, including the 7 that come with the page (Think-pair-share 3 min, Clean-up 5 min, Reading 10 min, Group work 15 min, Morning block, Centers x4, Test with breaks). Up to 24 presets and 24 steps per chain, all stored in this browser.

Why this timer stays accurate in the background

The countdown is computed from a target time, not by counting seconds, so a background tab, a dimmed phone or a laptop lid closed for a minute cannot make it drift. When you come back, the display jumps to the true remaining time; if the time ran out while you were away, the Time's up state and the tone fire once on return.

While a timer runs, the page asks the device to keep the screen awake (where the browser allows it) and shows the remaining time in the tab title, so you can see it from another tab. Nothing about the timer leaves the browser: activity names, preset names and chain names are stored locally and never appear in analytics.