On a 9:00 AM to 5:30 PM day, 2:30 PM leaves 3 hours until clock-out, with 64.7% of the day gone
If you start at 9:00 AM, finish at 5:30 PM and take a 30-minute lunch from 12:30 to 1:00 PM, then at 2:30 PM exactly 3 hours remain until you clock out. You have been at work 5 hours 30 minutes of an 8 hour 30 minute day, which is 64.7%. The lunch half hour comes out of the hours you work, so you have worked 5 hours and have 3 hours of work left. Those two add up to the 8-hour workday.
The countdown above takes your start, end and break times plus the days you work, and counts down to clock-out every second. A sun arcs across the day from your start time to your end time, and a bar fills for each work day of the week. Once you pass your end time it counts the minutes since, and on a weekend or holiday it counts down to your next start. Below the arc, a figure with a briefcase runs toward the exit door. It speeds up after the halfway point and sprints through the last 10%, stops with a coffee on your break, and jumps at the door when it is time to go.
When it helps to keep a clock-out countdown open
- Splitting up what is left. With 2 hours 40 minutes to go, you can tell at a glance whether one more meeting and the report both fit today. "Work left" excludes the break, so before lunch it reads shorter than "Until clock-out".
- Not missing your wrap-up window. Set an alert 10 or 30 minutes before the end and a chime tells you even while you are in another tab. The sound is scheduled ahead of time, so a hidden tab does not make it late.
- Seeing how far past quitting time you have gone. After your end time the big number turns into something like +1:12:30. It is a quick way to know how much extra you really put in before you work out what it is worth.
- Night shifts. If you start at 10:00 PM and finish at 6:00 AM, an end time earlier than the start time counts as the next morning. With no break entered, 3:00 AM shows 3 hours left.
- Getting through the last hour. Researchers call it the goal-gradient effect: the closer people are to a reward, the faster they act. Kivetz, Urminsky and Zheng (2006) found that customers with a coffee loyalty card bought coffee more often the nearer they got to a free one. That study looked at purchases, not at clocks at work, so it does not show that a countdown speeds anyone up. It does explain why people like to see how much is left.
How the numbers are worked out
- The day's frame. Your workday runs from the start time to the end time. If the end time is earlier than the start time, the shift ends the next day and counts as the day it began. The break has to start after you do and finish before you leave.
- Until clock-out = end time − now. It rounds up to the second, so the moment the display reads 00:00:00 is your end time. With milliseconds switched on, all three decimals are shown as they are.
- Day elapsed = (now − start) ÷ (end − start). It is measured on the clock, so break time counts as time that has passed, and it matches where the sun sits on the arc. Anything past the first decimal is dropped so it never shows 100.0% before you leave.
- Time worked and work left. Time worked is the time since you started minus any break already taken. Work left is the day's working hours minus time worked. The two always add up to the working hours.
- Before the start, after the end, days off. Before you start it shows both the time to your start and the time to clock-out. After you finish it counts the time since your end time, and at midnight it switches to the next work day. On a day off or a holiday it counts down to your next start.
- This week = hours worked on this week's work days ÷ total working hours for those days. The week runs Sunday to Saturday here. For a Monday to Friday 9:00 AM to 5:30 PM schedule at 2:30 PM on Wednesday, Monday and Tuesday are 16 hours and Wednesday is 5, so 21 of 40 hours is 52.5%. Work left is 19 hours, and Friday's clock-out is 2 days 3 hours away.
- Holidays. With "Federal holidays are days off" on, the 11 U.S. federal holidays count as days off. The date list covers 2026 and 2027. It is off by default, because a private employer decides which days it closes.
Time left by time of day on a 9:00 AM to 5:30 PM day (lunch 12:30 to 1:00 PM)
These are the values the screen shows for an ordinary weekday. "Until clock-out" is clock time, so lunch counts down too, while "Work left" pauses during lunch.
| Now | Status | Until clock-out | Day elapsed | Work left | Time worked |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8:30 AM | Before work | 09:00:00 | 0.0% | 8:00:00 | 0:00:00 |
| 9:00 AM | Working | 08:30:00 | 0.0% | 8:00:00 | 0:00:00 |
| 10:30 AM | Working | 07:00:00 | 17.6% | 6:30:00 | 1:30:00 |
| 12:30 PM | On break | 05:00:00 | 41.1% | 4:30:00 | 3:30:00 |
| 1:00 PM | Working | 04:30:00 | 47.0% | 4:30:00 | 3:30:00 |
| 2:30 PM | Working | 03:00:00 | 64.7% | 3:00:00 | 5:00:00 |
| 4:00 PM | Working | 01:30:00 | 82.3% | 1:30:00 | 6:30:00 |
| 5:20 PM | Working | 00:10:00 | 98.0% | 0:10:00 | 7:50:00 |
| 5:30 PM | After work | +00:00:00 | 100.0% | 0:00:00 | 8:00:00 |
| 7:00 PM | After work | +01:30:00 | 100.0% | 0:00:00 | 8:00:00 |
Hours, breaks and overtime under federal law
The Fair Labor Standards Act does not require employers to give workers breaks or meal periods, and it has no daily limit on hours. Some states do require breaks, so check your state labor department. The federal rule is about pay: a covered employee who is not exempt must get at least one and one-half times the regular rate for hours over 40 in a workweek, a fixed period of 168 hours (seven 24-hour days) that your employer sets.
Two points in Department of Labor Fact Sheet #22 decide what counts as work time. Rest periods of short duration, usually 20 minutes or less, must be counted as hours worked. A bona fide meal period, typically 30 minutes or more, generally need not be paid, but only if you are completely relieved from duty. Eating at your desk while you answer the phone keeps that time on the clock. As a reference point, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported that full-time workers averaged 8.1 hours on the days they worked in 2025.
| Schedule | Break | On site | Hours worked | Under the FLSA |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9:00 AM–5:30 PM | 12:30–1:00 PM lunch, fully off duty | 8 h 30 min | 8 h | The 30-minute meal period is not counted |
| 8:00 AM–5:00 PM | 12:00–1:00 PM lunch, fully off duty | 9 h | 8 h | The hour is not counted |
| 9:00 AM–5:00 PM | 30 minutes at the desk, still answering the phone | 8 h | 8 h | Not completely relieved of duty, so it is counted |
| 9:00 AM–5:00 PM | Two 15-minute rest breaks, no lunch | 8 h | 8 h | Rest periods of 20 minutes or less are counted |
| 7:00 AM–6:00 PM, four days | 1 hour lunch, off duty | 11 h a day | 10 h a day, 40 h a week | No overtime, since the week does not pass 40 hours |
| Monday to Friday, 8 h each, plus a 3 h Saturday | Off-duty lunches | – | 43 h a week | 3 hours past 40 are overtime at 1.5 times the regular rate |
| 10:00 PM–6:30 AM (night shift) | 2:00–2:30 AM, off duty | 8 h 30 min | 8 h | Federal law adds no night premium |
When quitting time has passed
After your end time a "+" appears in front of the big number and the time since clock-out grows every second. If you are still at work, that is the extra time you have put in. If you have already left, the sentence below the number gives your next start. At midnight it moves on to the next work day's countdown.
Federal overtime is counted by the week, not by the day. Staying an hour late on a Tuesday does not by itself earn overtime pay if your week stays at or under 40 hours, and exempt employees are not covered by the rule at all. Some states and employers set daily overtime rules of their own. To turn the extra time into dollars once you know how it is paid, you can open the same schedule in the live salary calculator.
How the clock-out alert stays on time
Chrome checks repeating timers in a tab that has been hidden for more than 5 minutes only once a minute (from Chrome 88, for pages that have been silent for at least 30 seconds). So if you stay in another tab for a long time, the alert banner and the tab title can lag by up to a minute. This countdown schedules the alert sound on the Web Audio clock ahead of time, so the sound plays at the right moment.
- Only alerts still to come are played once you pick one. An alert time that has already gone by does not ring.
- Browsers block sound until you click the page. If you reopen the page with a saved alert, click it once.
- If you close the browser or the computer goes to sleep, the alert will not ring.
- In full screen the display is kept awake in browsers that support the Screen Wake Lock API. Switching tabs releases the lock, and it is requested again when you come back.
Common slip-ups
- Counting 9:00 AM to 5:30 PM as 8.5 hours of work. With a 30-minute lunch it is 8 hours. "Day elapsed" uses the 8.5 hours on the clock, while "Work left" and "Time worked" use the 8 hours of work.
- Assuming federal law guarantees a lunch break. It does not for adults, though some states do. If your lunch is unpaid, you still have to be fully off duty for it to stay unpaid.
- Entering a night shift's end time as the same day. Type 6:00 AM as the end time for a 10:00 PM start. An end time earlier than the start means the next morning.
- Expecting overtime on any day over 8 hours. The federal threshold is 40 hours a week, so 9 hours on one day and 7 on another is still 40.
- Leaving the holiday switch on at a job that is open. With it on, July 4 or Thanksgiving counts down to your next start. Turn it off if you work those days.
- A wrong device clock. Every number comes from this device's clock, so a clock that is a few minutes off moves the end time by the same amount.
Limits
- You can enter one daily schedule. If your hours differ by weekday, or you work rotating shifts or flextime, enter that day's schedule instead.
- There is one break. Separate short rest breaks are not subtracted from "Work left".
- The holiday list covers 2026 and 2027. In other years holidays count as work days, and any extra day off your employer gives has to be set through the work days or the schedule.
- Alert sounds can fail because of a browser's autoplay rules or power saving.
- Your schedule and settings are saved only in this browser and do not carry over to other devices. The schedule is also in the page address, so a link moves it.
- It does not calculate pay. To see what you have earned today on the same schedule, open the live salary calculator.
As of October 18, 2026. The U.S. rules and data here (FLSA and the Department of Labor fact sheets, BLS American Time Use Survey 2025, OPM federal holidays) were checked against the original sources on 2026-10-18. Holiday dates cover 2026 and 2027, and the table and examples were calculated on October 18, 2026 with the same rules the screen uses.
Sources
- 01U.S. Department of Labor, Wage and Hour Division: FLSA Frequently Asked QuestionsThe FLSA does not require breaks or meal periods; some states have their own requirements
- 02U.S. Department of Labor: Fact Sheet #22, Hours Worked Under the FLSARest periods of 20 minutes or less are hours worked; bona fide meal periods, typically 30 minutes or more, generally are not, if the employee is completely relieved from duty
- 03U.S. Department of Labor: Overtime PayTime and one-half the regular rate for hours over 40 in a workweek, a fixed and regularly recurring period of 168 hours
- 04U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics: American Time Use Survey, 2025 ResultsReleased June 25, 2026. On days they worked, full-time employed people worked an average of 8.1 hours
- 05U.S. Department of Labor: Night WorkThe FLSA does not require extra pay for night work
- 06U.S. Office of Personnel Management: Federal HolidaysThe 11 public holidays for federal employees under 5 U.S.C. 6103
- 07Kivetz, Urminsky, Zheng (2006), The Goal-Gradient Hypothesis ResurrectedJournal of Marketing Research 43(1), 39–58. Customers with a coffee loyalty card bought more often as they got closer to a free coffee
- 08Chrome for Developers: Heavy throttling of chained JS timers beginning in Chrome 88Chained timers on pages hidden for over 5 minutes run once a minute, except pages that played sound in the last 30 seconds
- 09MDN: AudioScheduledSourceNode.start()Schedules a sound to start at a time on the same timeline as AudioContext currentTime
- 10MDN: Screen Wake Lock APIKeeps the screen from dimming or locking; the system releases the lock when the document is not visible
Frequently asked questions
How is the time until clock-out calculated?
It subtracts the current time from your end time. On a 9:00 AM to 5:30 PM day, 2:30 PM leaves 3 hours and 5:20 PM leaves 10 minutes. It rounds up to the second, so the moment it reads 00:00:00 is your end time.
Does lunch count toward the time left?
"Until clock-out" and "Day elapsed" follow the clock, so lunch is included. "Work left" and "Time worked" leave the break out. With 9:00 AM to 5:30 PM and lunch from 12:30 to 1:00 PM, 10:30 AM shows 7 hours until clock-out and 6 hours 30 minutes of work left.
What does it show after quitting time?
A plus sign appears in front of the big number and the time since your end time grows each second. With a 5:30 PM end time, 7:00 PM reads +01:30:00. The sentence below gives your next start, and at midnight it switches to the next work day.
Does it work for night shifts past midnight?
Yes. Enter an end time earlier than the start time and it ends the next day. With a 10:00 PM start and 6:00 AM end and no break, 3:00 AM shows 3 hours left. The shift counts as the day it started.
Will the alert ring if I am in another tab?
The alert sound is scheduled ahead of time on the audio clock, so it plays on time from another tab. The banner and tab title can lag by up to a minute when Chrome checks hidden-tab timers once a minute. It will not ring if you close the browser or the computer sleeps.
Is my schedule saved?
Your schedule and the milliseconds, message and alert settings stay in this browser and are not sent to a server. They are still there next time, and Reset to defaults clears them. The schedule is also in the page address, so a link moves it to another device.
What happens on weekends and holidays?
Days you leave out of the work days, and the 11 U.S. federal holidays when that switch is on, count down to your next start. The holiday list covers 2026 and 2027. The switch is off by default because private employers set their own days off.
Does federal law require a lunch break?
No. The Fair Labor Standards Act does not require breaks or meal periods for workers, though some states do. A meal period of 30 minutes or more generally need not be paid only if you are completely relieved from duty, and short rest breaks of 20 minutes or less count as hours worked.