2 Minute Timer
A 2 minute timer counts down 120 seconds and sounds an alarm when it reaches zero. That is 0.03 decimal hours on a timesheet, or 3.33% of an hour.
A two minute timer is the length behind the best known rule in personal productivity, and the length dentists have recommended for brushing since the 1970s.
Paused at 2:00
Your focus time, counted and kept
A countdown tells you when the block ends. PomoTodo records that the block happened, which task it went to and what the week added up to, so a month of 2 minute blocks becomes something you can actually look at.
Free plan tracks unlimited focus time across unlimited tasks. No card required.
The 2 minute timer at a glance
| Attribute | Value |
|---|---|
| Length | 2 minutes |
| Seconds | 120 |
| Decimal hours | 0.03rounded |
| Clock format | 0:02 |
| Share of an hour | 3.33% |
| Blocks per hour | 30 |
| Blocks per 8 hour day | 240 |
| Pomodoros (25 min each) | 0.08 |
| Decimal hours are rounded to two places, which is how payroll systems record them. Blocks per hour and per day count whole blocks only and ignore the break between them, so a working day fits fewer in practice. | |
What a 2 minute timer is used for
The two minute rule, brushing teeth, and steeping tea that turns bitter if forgotten.
- The two minute rule
- David Allen's rule in Getting Things Done is that any task finishable in two minutes gets done immediately rather than filed, and a timer is how you find out which tasks actually qualify.
- Brushing teeth
- Two minutes twice a day is the standard recommendation, and most people stop well short of it when guessing.
- Steeping green tea
- Green tea turns bitter past roughly two minutes, unlike black tea which wants three to five.
- Timed speaking rounds
- Debate rebuttals and stand-up meeting turns are commonly capped at two minutes per person.
2 minutes in other units
- 2 minutes is 120 seconds.
- On a timesheet, it is recorded as 0.03 decimal hours.
- It is 3.33% of an hour.
- 30 of them fit into one hour.
- An eight hour working day holds 240, before any break between blocks.
- Against the classic twenty-five minute Pomodoro, it is 0.08 blocks.
Converting a different length is what the minutes to decimal hours converter is for, and adding several together is what the hours calculator does.
Timers either side of 2 minutes
If 2 minutes is the wrong length, the two nearest are 1 minute and 3 minutes.
Questions about the 2 minute timer
What is the two minute rule?
If a task takes less than two minutes, do it now instead of adding it to a list. The rule comes from David Allen's Getting Things Done, and its point is that capturing, filing and revisiting a tiny task costs more than the task does.
How many seconds is a two minute timer?
One hundred and twenty seconds.