Online Countdown Timer
One-tap presets, custom times and shareable links. The countdown shows in your tab title.
How to use the countdown timer
Tap a preset (1–60 minutes) or type any custom minutes and seconds, then press Start or the space bar. The remaining time mirrors into your browser tab title, so you can keep an eye on it from any tab. When time is up, the display flashes and the tab title blinks Time is up!
| Action | Key |
|---|---|
| Start / Pause / Resume | Space |
| Reset to the last duration | R |
| Fullscreen | F |
Shareable timer links
Every duration has a URL. Add ?m=10 for 10 minutes, ?m=25&s=30 for 25:30, or ?t=90 for 90 seconds. Bookmark a link, send it to a friend, or paste it into a lesson plan:
- 5 minute timer · 10 minute timer · 15 minute timer · 20 minute timer
- 25 minute timer · 30 minute timer · 45 minute timer · 60 minute timer
Common uses
- Cooking & baking — hands-free kitchen timer with a fullscreen display readable across the room.
- Exams & quizzes — project the countdown so every student sees the remaining time.
- Meetings — keep agenda items on track with visible timeboxes.
- Kids' routines — bedtime, brushing teeth, screen time, “five more minutes” made concrete.
Choosing the right countdown duration
Odd as it sounds, the duration is the hardest part of using a timer well. Two rules fix most of it. First, time the task, not your optimism: if practice runs show the essay really takes 40 minutes, set 40, not 30, a timer that expires early just teaches you to ignore timers. Second, round up to the preset you will actually remember: 20 minutes beats 19 because the 20 minute timer link takes one tap. Presets exist because round numbers are easier to plan around ("we leave at the 15", "parking is the 60"), not because arbitrary values are better.
Building routines from timer links
Because every duration has its own URL, a timer link can be a bookmark, a calendar note or a text message. A household evening routine becomes three links: 10 minutes for tidying, 5 minutes for teeth, 20 minutes of reading, each opened in turn by whoever's turn it is. Teachers do the same with lesson plans: the quiz gets 5, pair work gets 15, the plenary 10. The links never change, so they survive being saved, shared and reused all term.
What the timer does when time is up
Three signals fire at once. The display flashes, the tab title alternates with Time is up! so you see it from any other tab, and the clock keeps counting up, showing exactly how overdue you are. That last part is the safety net an oven timer lacks: return five minutes late and you see "5:00 over" instead of silence, so you know whether to pull the roast out immediately or accept it. If the tab is closed, the countdown stops with it, there is no server sending notifications later.
Countdown timers in history
The countdown is older than the clock itself: hourglasses and water clocks counted down long before dials counted up. Sailors turned the glass every 30 minutes for centuries, which is why the ship's bell still rings in half-hour watches. Kitchen egg timers distilled the same idea into a four-minute dial. The modern twist arrived with the microwave oven in the 1960s, which made the countdown display a fixture of every home, and the browser timer is that same design, freed from the appliance: any duration, any tab, a link you can share.
Related tools
Measuring how long something takes instead? Use the online stopwatch with lap times. Doing focused work? The pomodoro timer cycles 25 minutes of work with 5-minute breaks automatically.