Free Timer and Stopwatch for Students. Plain and Focused.

The Pomodoro technique is great until it isn't.

You sit down to practice an MCAT section that's supposed to take 90 minutes. You sit down to time a chemistry experiment that runs for 12 minutes. You sit down to rehearse a talk that's allowed to be seven minutes long. None of those fit a 25 minute box.

You don't need cycles or breaks or session tracking. You just need a clean countdown or a stopwatch. So that's what this tool is.

What it does

There are two modes. The countdown timer lets you set any duration from one second up to several hours, with quick preset buttons for the times you'll reach for most often. When the time runs out, it plays a soft beep.

The stopwatch counts upward with hundredth of a second precision. You can record lap times as you go, up to fifty of them, and copy the whole list to your clipboard for later reference.

Both modes have a fullscreen button. When you click it, the timer takes over your entire screen with a dark background and a giant time readout. Everything else disappears. Tabs, notifications, your half written email, all gone until you press Escape to come back.

That dark fullscreen view is the part most people end up using. It's hard to describe how much of a difference it makes until you try it.

Try it now

acloom.com/tools/timer-stopwatch

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The timer above defaults to 25 minutes because it's a sensible starting point, but you can change it to anything. Your settings are saved in your browser so it'll come back the way you left it.

What it's actually good for

The Pomodoro tool is built around a fixed work and rest cycle. This one is built around the moments where that cycle doesn't apply. Some examples.

Test and exam prep. When you're practicing under exam conditions, you want the timer to run exactly as long as the real section. 60 minutes for a reading passage, 75 for a math block, 90 for a full essay. Fullscreen mode helps simulate the no distractions feeling of an actual exam room.

Lab work and experiments. Reactions that need to run for a fixed time, dough that needs to rise for a fixed time, brewing methods that depend on getting the seconds right. A timer you can read from across a workbench in low light is more useful than one buried in your phone.

Presentations and talks. Use the stopwatch to time yourself during rehearsal so you know if your seven minute talk is actually eight and a half. Use the countdown when you deliver, so you know exactly how much time you have left without staring at a tiny clock.

Workouts and intervals. HIIT, plank holds, breath work, meditation, stretching routines. The lap button captures split times for repeat sets, which is useful when you're trying to keep them consistent.

Speed practice. Typing tests, coding challenges, sprint reviews, sight reading. Stopwatch with proper centisecond resolution actually shows the progress.

Why fullscreen and dark mode

This one took us a while to commit to but the answer turned out to be straightforward.

A light timer on a normal browser window is fine for a five minute task. For anything longer than that, the glare adds up. Reading the screen from across the kitchen or across a lab bench gets harder. And every other tab in your browser is a tiny invitation to switch away from what you're doing.

The dark fullscreen mode solves all three at once. The contrast between a black background and a giant white time readout is easier on your eyes. It's visible from much further away. And there's nothing else on the screen to distract you.

If you're on a phone, fullscreen mode also prevents accidental taps that would otherwise interrupt the timer mid run.

Common questions

Does it work offline? Once the page is loaded, yes. The timer runs entirely in your browser. You can disconnect from the internet and it'll keep working.

Will it keep running if I switch tabs? Yes. Modern browsers slow down background timers a bit to save battery, but the elapsed and remaining times stay accurate. When you come back to the tab, it'll show the correct time.

Does it save my settings? Your last used mode and timer durations are stored in your browser's local storage. Nothing is sent to any server. If you clear your browser data, it'll reset to defaults.

Can I use this on my phone? Yes, it works on any modern mobile browser. Fullscreen mode is actually more useful on a phone because it prevents accidental taps and turns the screen into a dedicated timer.

How accurate is the stopwatch? The display updates every ten milliseconds, which is plenty precise for almost any task you'd realistically time with a browser stopwatch. For serious athletic timing you'd want dedicated equipment, but for typing tests, coding challenges, or interval training it's more accurate than you actually need.

Why is the fullscreen mode dark instead of matching the rest of the site? Pure visibility. A bright white screen with a giant time on it is uncomfortable to look at for long periods and harder to read from a distance. The dark background fixes both at once. The rest of the site stays in its normal style because it's read at normal viewing distances.

Related tools

• Study Timer (Pomodoro): the structured 25 and 5 minute version if your task fits the standard cycle
• PDF Text Extractor: pull text out of lecture slides before you start timing your study session
• Image to Text (OCR): digitize handwritten notes so you can review them between intervals