Scheduled social posts

Summary#

On the Social Dashboard you can write a post, choose which connected channels it goes to, set a date and time, and leave. Metric Vault publishes it for you. The queue below the composer shows what is waiting, what went out and what failed, with a Cancel button on anything that has not gone yet. Scheduling is free; each channel that accepts the post costs 1 credit when it sends.

Purpose#

Posting well means posting at times that suit your audience, not times that suit your calendar. Writing five posts on a Monday morning and having them go out across the week is the difference between a consistent presence and a burst followed by silence.

Scheduling also puts a gap between writing and publishing, which is where most mistakes get caught.

Requirements#

• A signed-in account on a paid plan. On Free, Schedule is refused straight away with This tool needs a paid plan. Free includes the 10 technical SEO tools; upgrade to Pro to unlock the rest. and nothing is queued.
• At least one connected social channel. Without one, the composer shows Connect a channel on the Integrations page to start posting. and there is nothing to schedule to. See Connecting social accounts.
• A time in the future. Anything less than about a minute ahead is rejected.
• Credits when the post sends: 1 for each channel that accepts it.
• For Instagram, an image attached to the post.

Permissions#

Scheduled posts belong to the account that created them. You can only see and cancel your own, and a teammate cannot cancel yours. Each person connects their own channels. See What teammates share.

If you schedule while switched into a team workspace, the workspace owner's plan and credits pay when the post sends. The post goes out on your own channels.

Navigation Path#

Dashboard → Promote → Social Dashboard

The screen has three cards in order: Compose a post, Calendar, and Scheduled posts, the last of which only appears once you have posts in the queue. Channels are connected at Dashboard → Account & Team → Integrations.

Step-by-Step Guide#

Schedule a post#

1. Check Connected channels at Dashboard → Account & Team → Integrations. A connected channel shows your account name; one that is not shows Not connected.
2. Open the Social Dashboard. In Compose a post, write into the box marked What do you want to share?
3. Every connected channel appears as a chip below the box, and all of them start selected. Select a chip to switch that channel off.
4. If Instagram is selected, press Add image and pick a PNG, JPG, WEBP or GIF up to 5 MB.
5. Watch the character count to the right. With X among your selected channels it reads <N> / 280 and turns red past the limit. With X switched off it just counts characters.
6. Set the date and time in the Schedule date and time field.
7. Press Schedule. The button reads Scheduling… while it saves.
8. On success the composer confirms with Scheduled for <date and time>., clears the text box and the time, and the post appears in the queue. An attached image stays attached until you press Remove.

To publish immediately instead, press Publish. That path reports the result for each channel straight away, including any per-channel error.

Schedule from the calendar#

1. In the Calendar card, find the day you want.
2. Select the + on that day, or the day cell itself.
3. The composer's time is set to 09:00 on that day and the page scrolls to it.
4. Adjust the time if you want, write the post, and press Schedule.

The calendar shows each scheduled post as a chip on its day, up to three per day before it collapses the rest into +N more. Today is highlighted. Prev and Next move a month; Today returns to the current one.

Watch the queue#

The Scheduled posts card lists upcoming and recent posts, newest first with anything still pending at the top. Each row shows the time, the text, the channel icons, Image when an image is attached, and a status badge.

An Interrupted row also shows Publishing was interrupted. Check your channels before reposting, because some may already have this post.

When a post did not fully go out, the reason is shown under it. Each channel that did not take the post is listed by name with the platform's reason. An error that stopped the whole post, such as an allowance refusal or an interrupted send, is shown on its own. A Posted row lists only the channels that failed.

The card is hidden entirely when the queue is empty, so a blank space where you expected it means nothing is scheduled and nothing recent has gone out.

Cancel a post#

Press Cancel on the row. The button reads Canceling… and the row returns as Canceled.

Cancel appears on rows marked Scheduled and on rows marked Interrupted. A post that is being sent right now cannot be recalled, and once it is published, cancelling in Metric Vault would not remove it from the platform anyway. Delete it on the platform itself. If a cancel is refused, a notice reads That post could not be canceled. It may already have gone out.

What happens behind the scenes#

A scheduler wakes the publisher roughly every 15 minutes. Each pass does three things.

First, it settles interrupted posts: any post still sending after 10 minutes. If it never reached a channel, it goes back to Scheduled and is sent normally. If it had started sending, it is marked Failed, because some channels may already have it and sending it again could post it twice.

Then it takes up to 25 posts whose time has passed and claims each one, so two passes can never send the same post twice. For each post it checks:

• Is publishing switched on? If not, the post stays Scheduled for a later pass.
• Does the plan allow publishing, with credits for every channel? The payer is the account, or the workspace owner, recorded when you scheduled. If not, the post is marked Failed. If the check itself cannot run, the post stays Scheduled.

Finally it publishes to each selected channel in parallel, renewing X, LinkedIn and TikTok connections that are close to expiring, and charges 1 credit for each channel that accepted the post.

Consequences worth planning around:

• A post goes out at or shortly after its time, not exactly on it. Treat the time you set as "no earlier than". A post set for 09:00 typically publishes within about a quarter of an hour.
• Partial success counts as success. If you selected three channels and one accepted the post, the row reads Posted, and the two that failed are listed under it with their reasons.
• A failed post is not retried. A post marked Failed stays that way. Fix the cause and schedule it again.

Each publish also writes a Posted to <channel> entry into your activity history, so the record survives even after the row ages out of the queue. See Report history.

Screenshots#

Tips#

• Schedule a few minutes off the hour. Everyone posts at 09:00; 09:20 is less crowded, and the publishing window makes an exact hour unrealistic anyway.
• Switch X off for anything long. The counter only warns about 280 characters when X is one of the selected channels, and X rejects the post outright when it is over: This post is <N> characters; X allows 280. Trim <M> and try again. Threads has its own limit of 500, counted in bytes.
• Write channel-appropriate copy in separate posts rather than one post to everything. The composer allows both, but a LinkedIn paragraph rarely reads well on X.
• Use the calendar's + rather than the date field when planning a week. It fills the date for you and lands at 09:00, which you can then nudge.
• Cancel and re-schedule rather than trying to edit. There is no edit.

Best Practices#

• Check Connected channels before a batch. An expired connection is only visible as an error after the post has already failed.
• Make sure your credits cover the batch. Each post is checked and charged when it sends, not when you schedule it.
• Keep at least a day between writing and publishing when the post carries a claim, a price or a launch date. That gap is the point of scheduling.
• Reconnect a channel as soon as a post fails on it. Every later post to that channel will fail the same way until you do.
• Pair the queue with Editorial workflow and calendar. Plan the content there, publish it here.

Common Mistakes#

• Scheduling to Instagram without an image. It is refused at schedule time.
• Scheduling to TikTok. It fails at publish time, because TikTok needs a video.
• Expecting the post at the exact minute. The publisher runs on a cycle. Set the time you want it no earlier than.
• Reading Posted as "posted everywhere". One successful channel is enough for that badge. Any channel listed under the post failed.
• Reposting an Interrupted post without checking. Some channels may already have it.
• Looking for the queue when it is empty. The card is hidden, not empty.
• Trying to cancel a Posted row. Delete it on the platform instead.
• Assuming a failed post will retry. It will not.

Limitations#

• One image per post, sent to Instagram only. No video, so TikTok cannot be used.
• No editing. Cancel and schedule a new one.
• No recurring or repeating posts.
• No per-channel variants of the same post from one composer action.
• No draft state. A post is either scheduled or not.
• No approval step before publishing.
• Post text is stored up to 4,000 characters.
• The queue shows your most recent 100 posts.
• Up to 25 due posts are published per pass. A very large batch all set to the same minute spills into the next pass.

Troubleshooting#

FAQs#

Does scheduling cost credits? Scheduling itself is free. When the post sends, each channel that accepts it costs 1 credit, and a channel that fails costs nothing.

How exact is the publish time? It publishes at or after the time you set, typically within about fifteen minutes. It never publishes early.

Can I schedule an image or a video? An image, yes: one per post, and Instagram requires it. Video is not supported, which is why TikTok cannot be used.

Can I edit a scheduled post? No. Cancel it and schedule a new one.

What happens if I disconnect a channel after scheduling? The post is attempted and that channel returns Not connected. Connect <channel> first. If it was the only channel, the row reads Failed.

What happens if I run out of credits before a post is due? Schedule checks your credits when you schedule, and refuses a post your remaining allowance cannot cover. Credits can still run out between scheduling and the time the post is due. Then the post is marked Failed when it is due, with the reason under it. It is not sent and not charged.

Will Metric Vault tell me when a post goes out? Not by email or in the notifications feed. The queue badge and your activity history record it.

Can a teammate see or cancel my queue? No. Queues are per account.

Does cancelling remove a post that already published? No. Cancel only exists while a post is waiting or interrupted. Remove a published post on the platform itself.