Best hours to buy and sell
Pick a market and an item. Every hour of the day shows its typical price, lowest buyout and listings, and the page names the cheapest hours to buy, the dearest to sell, and what the gap is worth after the 5 percent cut.
Current market: Normal Alliance US. This browser opens every tool here until you pick another. Address for this market: ahledger.com/timing?market=forever/normal/alliance/us
Item
Best hours to buy
Not enough hours scanned yet.
Best hours to sell
Not enough hours scanned yet.
Spread after the 5% cut
Needs both windows.
Confidence
No pattern
No pattern yet: only 2 of the 24 hours of the day have been scanned on this market in the last 28 days. It fills in as players scan through the day.
Item 285268by hour · Normal Alliance US
| Hour (UTC) | Pacific | Typical | Lowest | Listings | Index | Days |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 03:00 | 16s | 16s | 1.000 | |||
| 04:00 | 16s | 16s | 1.000 |
Under 1.000 is a cheap hour to buy; over 1.000 a good hour to sell. Days counts how many days that hour was scanned in the window. The same figures as JSON: /v1/timing/forever.normal.alliance.us/285268 on the API.
The whole market by hour · Normal Alliance US
| Hour (UTC) | Pacific | Price index | Listings index | Days |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 00:00 | 0.988 | 1.007 | 4 | |
| 01:00 | 0.992 | 1.039 | 4 | |
| 02:00 | 0.958 | 1.060 | 5 | |
| 03:00 | 0.968 | 1.071 | 4 | |
| 04:00 | 0.970 | 1.077 | 4 | |
| 05:00 | 0.980 | 1.089 | 4 | |
| 06:00 | 1.000 | 1.102 | 5 | |
| 07:00 | 0.968 | 0.971 | 3 | |
| 08:00 | 0.999 | 1.110 | 1 | |
| 09:00 | 0.988 | 1.111 | 2 | |
| 10:00 | 0.997 | 1.063 | 4 | |
| 11:00 | 0.999 | 1.005 | 3 | |
| 12:00 | 1.026 | 0.927 | 2 | |
| 13:00 | 1.005 | 0.941 | 2 | |
| 14:00 | 1.022 | 0.890 | 5 | |
| 15:00 | 1.024 | 0.885 | 4 | |
| 16:00 | 1.081 | 0.786 | 2 | |
| 17:00 | 1.028 | 0.839 | 4 | |
| 18:00 | 1.003 | 0.960 | 5 | |
| 19:00 | 1.062 | 0.752 | 4 | |
| 20:00 | 0.970 | 1.076 | 4 | |
| 21:00 | 0.982 | 1.131 | 4 | |
| 22:00 | 1.013 | 0.912 | 4 | |
| 23:00 | 0.977 | 1.196 | 3 |
Each hour is indexed against the 24 hours around it, item by item across the market's largest positions, then centred so an average hour reads 1.000. For the day-of-week pattern, see market structure.
▸How this is worked out
Every hourly price is divided by the same item's average over the 24 hours around it, so a price drifting over the month does not make one end of the day look dear. The best buy window is the cheapest run of three hours and the best sell window the dearest; the spread buys at the cheap window's lowest buyout and sells at the dear window's typical price less the cut. Forever's history restarts at launch, so a live market's pattern never includes beta scans.
Common questions
- How is the hour-of-day pattern worked out?
- Every hourly price is divided by the same item’s average over the 24 hours around it, so a price drifting up or down over the month does not make one end of the day look dear, and the 24 hours are then centred so an average hour reads 1.000. The best buy window is the cheapest run of three hours and the best sell window the dearest. Hours are UTC, with the hour on the wall in the zone most of the market’s players keep beside them.
- How much history does the pattern need?
- Each hour of the day needs a few days of scans behind it before its figure means anything. The confidence line reads the thinnest hour: settled from ten days of scans, provisional from three, too early under that, and no pattern at all while fewer than half the hours have been scanned. Scanning Normal Alliance US through the night fills the gaps.