How to Schedule a WordPress Post to Publish Later

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Did you know WordPress has a post scheduling feature?

Scheduling a post allows you to tell WordPress precisely when you want it published, so you don’t have to be in your dashboard clicking the Publish button.

You can schedule a WordPress post to publish on any day of the year down to the exact hour and minute you want. Find out how in this quick tutorial.

How to Schedule a WordPress Post

The first step is to visit the post you want to schedule in your dashboard.

Once there, locate the Status & Visibility section at the top of the sidebar.

Status Visibility

You’ll notice that the Immediately text is linked. It won’t take you to a different page – it’s actually a button.

Click the Immediately button and you’ll see a calendar modal window appear:

Post Scheduling Calendar

As you can see, you can use the inputs to add a date or use the visual calendar to select the upcoming publish date.

Once you’ve chosen the date to schedule the post, you can click anywhere else on the screen to close the calendar popup. The new date will appear in place of the “Immediately” text.

New Post Date

With these date settings, you can specify the exact minute you want the post published. Just click the blue Schedule button at the top of the sidebar to finalize your post scheduling.

If you want a more visual way to schedule and plan your posts, you might like my new plugin, Strive Content Calendar.

Strive Content Calendar

It lets you visualize your entire publishing schedule and drag-and-drop your posts to quickly reschedule them.

One More Thing!

Before you go, visit the General Settings page and check your site’s timezone setting.

Timezone Settings

Make sure your site is using your timezone. If your site is using a different timezone, your scheduled post is not going to get published when you want it to.

Once that’s in order, you’re ready to enjoy the benefits of WordPress’ automated post scheduling.

If you have any questions about how to schedule a post with WordPress, post your comments below!

Ben Sibley
Ben Sibley
This article was written by Ben Sibley. He is a WordPress theme designer & developer, and founder of Compete Themes.