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Which day of the week do you get your best coding work done?

Ben Halpern on May 24, 2022

Whether a matter of personal productivity or circumstance, which part of the week is best for your most personally productive work.

Please get into details of what makes you productive on those days — whether it is how meetings typically stack up or otherwise.

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dendihandian profile image
Dendi Handian • Edited

not monday, nor friday

meme

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nombrekeff profile image
Keff

Acurate

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DevFranPR

minimalWage === this

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Kristine Gusta

I will be the odd one but I will say - Monday ! It is the first office day of the week (we have a hybrid setting) , and you still have energy from the weekend.

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Jessica Veit

Same here! I generally fill my free time with other activities than coding, so on Mondays I am so hyped to finally get it started again 🤩

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Ridhwana Khan

The day that I have no meetings :D

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JoelBonetR 🥇

No meetings? Does that even exist? 😱

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Augusts Bautra

Productivity must cluster in the middle of the week. Monday is for gearing up and by Friday I'm exhausted. Used to be I moved mountains on Thursdays, but nowadays it's the meeting day. Should probably change that.

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Ben Halpern

I'll go first: We have "no meeting Fridays" which are pretty great for a certain type of productivity, but it's also a way to ease into the weekend, so I don't try to make those the maximally productive days.

By Wednesday and Thursday, most key communication is behind me — as well as a lot of my "critical tasks" and I can usually get some good stuff done on more creative work those days.

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Chris Greening • Edited

Hmmm never thought about it before but definitely Thursday:

  • knocked out tedious chores earlier in the week
  • built up momentum and cleared away post-weekend brain fog
  • almost EOW so I have motivation to be productive otherwise weekend work
  • we schedule a lot of internal and client meetings for M-W so Th is the first day I can jump into an IDE and just hack away without interruption
  • excited for the weekend but not so excited that I can still focus
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Diner Das

Sunday on a side project I really care about. Saturdays tend to be home chore days.

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Jacob Enders

Friday.

On Monday I feel like I have a mountain of upcoming work.

But on Friday, I have that sense that 90% of the weeks tasks are finished. I can then enter Zen mode and work on things that I didn't expect to get to this week. I am way more productive when I can work in Zen mode.

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Keff

For me, it's usually Wednesdays or Thursdays. Mondays are packed with meetings and management stuff, and on Fridays, I'm usually quite exhausted and we do sprint reviews each 2 weeks, so not the most productive for me.

Wednesday and Thursday I can get work done most of the day if I don't have too many PRs to review. On a good Thursday, I can get a straight 4h block of coding time at most (usually less)

It's been a while since I've had one of those coding days where you spend all day coding... I kinda miss those 😔

Regarding Tuesdays, I don't believe they exist xD

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ImTheDeveloper • Edited

I did some work for a business which actually had impressive data on not just their own but a few 100 other businesses across industries to measure "output". This may have been simply widgets produced (manual), to cases worked (e.g. request for pension payouts), to lines of code written (based on end of day commits through a period) through to sales ads approved etc. Super broad...

Regardless the data always showed Tuesday as the most "productive" followed by a Wednesday, approx 10-15% loss of output. Then Thursday and Monday was quite interchangeable dependent on the industry. Friday categorically dire.

There were lots of ideas as to the reasons and some are actually quite simple. If you map over the top the resources available, you generally see Mondays are a good long weekend or an easy sick day. Fridays are typically the half day, half pay and long weekend candidates also. The workforce that is available on a Monday typically talk about their weekends, get up to speed with their tasks for the week and when they hit Tuesday they've got themselves set up.

By Wednesday you're now losing productivity typically due to the output of a Tuesday surfacing issues / problems / meetings etc. Most businesses tend to schedule "events" on a Wednesday e.g. training, awareness (h&s) etc so you lose hours. "Mid week check in" as well as weekly reporting up through the business also becomes a drag.

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Randall

It's Thursday for me. I block off the entire day for coding. Still end up with meetings sometimes anyway though. It's not really preference, just Thursday was the day I have the fewest recurring obligations, so I chose it.

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Somtochukwu Nnaji

As long as the coding is goin smoothly i only stop for a coffee :) But i'd say the middle of the week is the best for me.

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Bek Brace

same here !

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Jackson Kasi • Edited

On Friday. Because in the next two days I will get a leave😅

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Ayu Adiati

Tuesday - Thursday are the best days for me.

We do big house chores on weekends, so I usually take Monday and Friday a bit slow, like do some blog writing and watch/read tutorials with a little house chores in between 😁

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Alain D'Ettorre

Monday - "we (you) really need to do this by friday"
Tuesday - "we (you) really really need to do this by friday"
Wednesday - "we (you) desperately need to do this by friday"
Wednesday - Maybe they let me work
Thursday - "we're doing it by tomorrow right? How about by the end of today? Is it done?"
Friday, every 10 minutes - "are you done? are you done?" (Yes twice)

That's daunting to say the least.

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Martin Muller 🇩🇪🇧🇷🇵🇹

All the same. I try to treat every day the same Mo - Sun including when waking up or going to bed. Is much easier for the body. I love every day and I am so happy and blessed to work as a developer. Thanks

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Konstantin BIFERT

I don't like the first four days of the week, I'm quite productive on Friday because I know that I can work on some stuff on the week-end.
But mainly, I'm more of a night owl so: productive late a night. 👌🏻

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Thomas Bnt

Thursday. For no reason, except that it's almost the end of the week, it motivates me to work harder to finish the two three codes before the weekend. 🚀

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ca55idy

Any day that isn't packed with pointless meetings

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Parker Waiters

I'm a 6 AM on Monday morning kind of guy. 5 or so hours of good work before new stuff gets put on my plate.

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Suraj Vishwakarma

Weekend. On other day of week, doing technical writing for myself and other clients. On weekends, work on projects.

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Bek Brace • Edited

Hey Ben.
Usually on Wednesdays!

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Ritam Chakraborty

When you hate your office job and love programming it has to be Saturday. Had fun programming whole day then chill in Monday. 😌

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Tawhid

sunday(after two days of on fri and sat so productive in sunday) and wednesday(it's wednesday my dudes!)

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John Halsey

Thursday. I usually have zero meetings and tend to WFH on Thursdays. These are my most code-filled days.

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Tu Trinh

Thursday is my best coding day.

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kasandrop

I do not like when a picture tells me what I should do. Would like to block you in order not to see that nonsense in the future!

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Oskar Pietrucha

Thursday as I want to finish as much as I can, so I have a pretty much free Friday ^_^

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Doaa Mahely

The first half of Monday before we're closing the sprint 🏃

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KaRthick

Friday !

may because of the enthu that I'm going to get a two day off 😉

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JoelBonetR 🥇

The day with less meetings 😂😅

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Mangabo Kolawole

Monday and Friday

monday because it's the first day of the week

Friday because I have to close those tickets I've left between tuesday, wednesday and thursday 😆

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kenyasue

Sunday night, when I was totally tired being with my kids whole 2 days and after they left sleep, finally I can write code in the silence and darkness.

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૮༼⚆︿⚆༽つ

1~2hr session of Sunday morning before preparing a breakfast.
Inspiration just came when you're in the kitchen 😆

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Andrew Baisden • Edited

I don't know it's completely random and there are infinite variables to take into account. I will say that I had a really good work day yesterday and today. So thats a win for Mondays and Tuesdays!

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Guilherme

my BEST coding is probably on weekends, when I have time and freedom to work on my own stuff... work has some ~problems~ that sometimes keep me from doing my best

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Jack

Wednesday. Why? The house is empty for once 😅

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Camco

Monday, Wednesday, sometimes Friday

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Simon Egersand 🎈

The earlier in the week, the better!

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Medea

Friday :)

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fredlag

The day with the less meeting usually friday for me

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N Cee Dee

Everyday 🥰

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Domenico Rizzo

Every day is a good day. It does not matter the day but the spirit which we face it

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Linus F. Müller • Edited

I am still attending school. That is why probably saturday. Although I do some programming every day. I get the most and best work on my projects in the saturday morning hours done.

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Dan Rosenberg

Monday 😉

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Lohanna Sarah

I produce the most between Tuesday and Thursday, Monday and Friday I am in a lower pace