It’s anyone’s guess what President-elect Donald Trump will tweet next.
But when he will tweet is much more predictable.
Since Election Day, the most common time for Trump to jump on Twitter — including re-tweeting and replying to other users — has been between 6 a.m. and 9:59 a.m., according to a Globe review of activity for his @realDonaldTrump account.
Trump, as of the end of the day Tuesday, had posted more than 350 tweets, retweets, and replies since becoming president-elect on Nov. 9, with about 43 percent of that activity coming between 6 a.m. and 9:59 a.m.
The single most common hour during which Trump has used Twitter has been during 8 a.m. window, which has accounted for about 15 percent of his activity since the election.
Advertisement
While on the campaign trail, Trump had a noticeably different social media schedule.
The timing of his Twitter activity was far less predictable, according to a review of about 7,800 Trump tweets, retweets, and replies tracked during that span by the Trump Twitter Archive, a website that says it has collected and stored virtually every tweet sent from Trump’s account since he joined Twitter in May 2009.
Just 19 percent of his Twitter activity during the campaign came between 6 a.m. and 9:59 a.m.
The most common hours during which Trump used Twitter while campaigning were the 9 p.m. and 10 p.m. time slots, each of which accounted for 7 percent of his usage.
While campaigning, there were no hours of the day too obscure for Trump to use Twitter, though tweets between 1 a.m. and 5:59 a.m. were rare.
Since becoming president-elect, he has not tweeted at all during the 2 a.m., 3 a.m., and 4 a.m. hours. He’s tweeted twice during the 1 a.m. hour and once during the 5 a.m. hour.
Advertisement
One factor that may account for Trump’s differing tweet schedules pre- and post-election is all the traveling that he did during the campaign, including to different US time zones.
All times referenced in this story are in Eastern Time (and account for changes between Eastern Daylight and Eastern Standard time). So, for example, if Trump was on the West Coast and sent a late-night tweet, it could appear to have been sent early the next morning in Eastern Time. But since the election, Trump has traveled to other time zones less. And his home in New York City, his Florida estate, and Washington D.C., are all on Eastern Time.
Both during the campaign and since becoming president-elect, Trump has used Twitter a bit more on Sundays and on Tuesdays than other days of the week, but there’s not a significant difference in usage based on the day of the week.
The data also show that Trump’s use of Twitter has slowed significantly since winning the election, though the tweets have still generated plenty of controversy.
He’s sent about 5 tweets per day, on average, since becoming president-elect.
During the campaign, he tweeted about 15 times per day, on average.
Believe it or not, there were times prior to Trump’s public pursuit of political office when he used Twitter even more frequently.
For example, during 2013, he averaged 22 tweets per day.
Before officially announcing his presidential bid, Trump was noticeably less active on Twitter on Saturdays and Sundays and was most likely to tweet between 2 p.m. and 4:59 p.m.
Advertisement
Trump, who recently reached a milestone of 20 million Twitter followers, indicated in a Fox News interview this week, he would continue taking to Twitter as president. “Look, I don’t like tweeting,” he said. “I have other things I could be doing. But I get very dishonest media, very dishonest press. And it’s my only way that I can counteract.”
Matt Karolian of the Globe staff contributed to this report. Matt Rocheleau can be reached at matthew.rocheleau@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter @mrochele