How Long Does a LinkedIn Post Last? Data From 427 Tracked Posts (2026)

The median LinkedIn post has 57% of its 30-day impressions after 24 hours, 73% after 48 hours and 89% after one week. It reaches 90% of its total on day 8 or 9, and most posts are still picking up readers on day 30. Comments stop much earlier: by the end of day two the median post has every comment it will ever get.

That is from 427 posts across 43 ContentIn accounts, each tracked from the first hours after publishing through day 30. The rest of this page is the full curve, how we measured it, where it differs from the "first hour decides everything" advice, and what to do with it.

How long a LinkedIn post lasts, in numbers

We snapshot every tracked post's impressions, reactions and comments every 30 minutes on day one, every two hours for the rest of the first week, every six hours in weeks two to four, and daily after that. For each post we took its total at day 30 and asked what share of that total had already arrived at each point in time. The table shows the median post, with the middle half of posts (25th to 75th percentile) in brackets.

Time since publishing	Share of 30-day impressions	Share of 30-day likes	Share of 30-day comments
1 hour	7% (4 to 13)	7%	0%
3 hours	22% (13 to 32)	29%	33%
6 hours	35% (24 to 45)	50%	57%
12 hours	48% (36 to 57)	62%	67%
24 hours	57% (46 to 66)	74%	87%
48 hours	69% (61 to 77)	88%	100%
Day 7	89% (84 to 93)	100%	100%
Day 14	96%	100%	100%
Day 21	98%	100%	100%

Three numbers summarise it:

• Half-life: 13 hours. The median post has half of its 30-day reach 13 hours after publishing (middle half of posts: 8 to 28 hours).
• 90% point: 8.5 days. Half the posts hit 90% between day 6 and day 12.
• 27% of impressions arrive after day two. 11% arrive after day seven.

So a LinkedIn post has two very different lifespans depending on what you count. If you count conversation, it is over in 48 hours. If you count readers, it runs for a week and keeps dripping for a month.

Comments stop at 48 hours. Reach doesn't.

This is the finding that changes how you should read your own posts. Reactions and comments front-load much harder than impressions:

• At 6 hours: 35% of impressions, 50% of likes, 57% of comments.
• At 24 hours: 57% of impressions, 74% of likes, 87% of comments.
• At 48 hours: 73% of impressions, 88% of likes, 100% of comments.

The comment section is the only clock LinkedIn shows you. When it goes quiet on day two, the post looks finished. It isn't. A quarter of its readers haven't seen it yet, and those readers are the ones who found it without a notification, which usually means they searched, were shown it in a "suggested" slot, or had it sent to them.

For 311 of the 427 posts (73%), more than a fifth of total impressions arrived after day two. And 84% of posts grew by more than 5% between day 7 and day 30, with a median growth of 12.5% in that window.

The first hour decides 7%

Most LinkedIn advice treats the first 60 minutes as decisive: get reactions in fast, reply to every comment immediately, or the algorithm buries the post. In this data the first hour accounts for 7% of a post's 30-day impressions. After six hours, a third. After a full day, just over half.

Bigger posts start slower, not faster:

30-day impressions	Posts	Share at 24h	Share at 48h	Half-life	90% point
Under 200	145	60%	70%	11.3 hours	8.4 days
200 to 1,000	206	58%	69%	12.7 hours	8.6 days
Over 1,000	76	52%	65%	21.2 hours	9.1 days

Posts that ended above 1,000 impressions took a median of 21 hours to reach half their reach, and the spread was wide: several posts that finished above 50,000 impressions had under 5% of that at the 24-hour mark and 99% by day 7. Judged at 24 hours, they would have been written off.

This fits what we found earlier about posting time no longer being the lever it was: LinkedIn's current ranking keeps re-evaluating a post for days, so a slow start is not a verdict.

What this means for how you post

1. Run two clocks

Clock one is 48 hours. That is where the conversation happens and where the people who could hire you show up in the comments. Answer every comment in the first two days. After that, stop refreshing; there won't be more.

Clock two is eight days. Don't delete, repost or change your whole approach because of a post that is two days old. It has a week of reading left. Decide what a post taught you on day 8, not day 2.

2. Judge posts at the same age

If you compare one post at 24 hours to another at 7 days, the first is at 57% and the second at 89%. Compare posts against your own median at the same age, or wait a week before ranking them. Our guide to LinkedIn post analytics covers where to read the numbers.

3. Three posts a week is enough

If a post reads for about eight days, three posts a week means there is always one post in its conversation window and two still collecting readers. Daily posting doesn't buy more reach per post; it buries posts that were still working.

4. Look at who read it late

Once a week, open a post from seven days ago and look at who engaged since the comments stopped. Late readers found the post without a notification. They are usually a better fit than the day-one crowd, who are mostly your existing connections.

How we measured it

• Sample: 427 personal-profile posts from 43 ContentIn accounts, published between 3 August and 24 September 2026. Median 30-day impressions: 311 (middle half: 156 to 637).
• Tracking: cumulative impressions, reactions and comments snapshotted from LinkedIn's analytics, roughly every 30 minutes on day one and at decreasing frequency afterwards.
• Inclusion: only posts whose tracking started within three hours of publishing, so the early curve is real rather than reconstructed. We dropped 681 posts whose tracking started later, 31 with fewer than 28 days of data, and 7 with under 30 impressions.
• Marks: the share at each hour mark is the last snapshot at or before that mark. Day marks are UTC calendar days. The 90% point is read at daily granularity after 48 hours.
• Caveat: this is ContentIn users with tracking on, most of them posting on a schedule. It is not a random sample of LinkedIn. Reaction and comment shares exclude posts with zero of that metric (409 posts for likes, 272 for comments).

Five of the 43 accounts contributed 145 of the 427 posts, so the curve leans toward frequent posters. The size-bucket table above is the check on that: the shape holds across small and large posts.

What ContentIn does with this

ContentIn builds a receipt for every post about 48 hours after it goes out: who engaged, whether they could hire you, and how the post did against your own median. 48 hours is the right moment for the people part, because the comments are in and the reactions nearly. The reach number on the receipt is the 48-hour reach, so read it as the floor; the median post adds about 30% on top over the following week. Try it on your own posts with a 7-day free trial.

FAQ

How long does a LinkedIn post stay visible?

In our data the median post reaches 90% of its 30-day impressions after 8 to 9 days and is still collecting readers on day 30. Visibility in the feed drops sharply after 48 hours, but search, "suggested" slots and shares keep delivering readers for weeks.

Does the first hour on LinkedIn matter?

Less than the advice suggests. The first hour accounts for a median 7% of a post's 30-day impressions, and posts that finish over 1,000 impressions start slower than small ones (half-life 21 hours versus 11). Replying to comments in the first two days matters because that is when comments happen; the first hour by itself is not a verdict.

When should I judge whether a post worked?

Day 8. At 24 hours you are seeing about 57% of the post's reach; at 48 hours, about 73%. Comments are complete by day two, so the "people" question can be answered early, but the reach question needs a week.

How is this different from engagement rate benchmarks?

Engagement rate compares reactions to impressions at a point in time. Because reactions front-load faster than impressions, a post's engagement rate falls over its first week even when nothing is wrong. Our engagement benchmarks are measured at the same age for every post for that reason.