The Slack Timer & Clock Icon, Explained

The Clock Next to Your Status = "Clear After"

When you set a custom status in Slack, you can choose when it should automatically clear. That setting is called Clear after, and while a clear-after time is active, Slack shows a small clock next to your status. It's a visual cue that the status is temporary and will disappear on its own.

The Clear after menu gives you these options:

• Don't clear — the status stays until you remove it manually.
• 30 minutes
• 1 hour
• 4 hours
• Today — clears at the end of the day.
• This week — clears at the end of the week.
• Choose date and time — a custom expiry you pick yourself.

So if you see a clock on someone's status (or your own), it simply means the status has an expiry set. To remove the clock, edit the status and set Clear after to "Don't clear." For the full click-by-click walkthrough, see how to set custom Slack status timing.

/remind — Slack's Built-In Reminder Timer

If you want Slack to ping you (or a channel) at a specific time, the /remind command is the built-in timer for that. Type it in any message box and Slack parses the time for you. A few examples:

• /remind me to send the report at 3pm
• /remind me in 20 minutes to take a break
• /remind #channel every Monday at 9am

Reminders can be one-off or recurring, and you can aim them at yourself, another person, or a whole channel. To see everything you have queued up, type /remind list — Slackbot will show your active and recurring reminders and let you mark them complete or delete them.

Scheduled Send — The Clock Beside the Send Button

There's also a timer for outgoing messages. Next to the message Send button is a small clock/arrow icon. Click it instead of sending immediately, pick a date and time, and Slack will hold the message and send it automatically at the moment you chose.

This is handy for writing a message now but delivering it during someone's working hours, or lining up a Monday-morning update on a Friday afternoon. Scheduled messages sit in a "Scheduled" view where you can edit, reschedule, or cancel them before they go out.

The Away / Inactivity Timer (a Different Thing)

There's one more "timer" people mean when they search for this — but it isn't a clock icon at all. Slack automatically flips your presence from active (green dot) to Away after a period of inactivity. This is automatic: Slack watches for activity and changes your dot on its own, with no clock shown anywhere.

Because the exact trigger differs between desktop and mobile, we won't put a single number on it here. For the precise behaviour — when it kicks in and what counts as "activity" — see when does Slack go inactive.

If It's the Away Timer You're Fighting

Most people who search for a "Slack timer" are actually frustrated by the away timer — Slack flipping their dot to Away the moment they step away from the keyboard. If that's you, the Clear-after clock and /remind won't help; you need your presence to stay active.

Stay Green On Slack keeps your presence dot solid green from the cloud, independent of whether your computer is awake or you're at the keyboard. No inactivity timer, no Away. There's a 14-day free trial — start it here.