Set working hours so screens turn on/off automatically

A display schedule turns a screen on and off automatically at set times — so screens follow business hours, save power and last longer, without anyone switching them by hand.

There is no single "opening/closing hours" box to fill in. On a screen, turn on and turn off are two separate timed commands — a display_on in the morning and a display_off at night. Repeat each one every day (or on the weekdays you choose), and together they are the screen's working hours.

On/off is just power — it doesn't choose what plays. When a screen turns on, it immediately resumes its main playlist — whatever was last published to it — straight from the screen's own storage (no internet needed at that moment), and keeps playing it until something replaces it. So a screen that comes on at 10:00 plays its main playlist from 10:00 onward. To show a different playlist at a set time — say a Lunch menu from 11:00 — set that up with Scheduled publishing; the main playlist simply plays whenever nothing else has taken over.

Where the schedule lives — Schedule Management

Everything timed for a screen lives in the Schedule Management area — not on the device list itself:

1. On the playlist page, open the device list from the right edge.

2. Click the Schedule Management bar — the labelled strip (with an arrow) between the device list and the calendar. It opens a weekly calendar for your screens.

3. Move through time with Previous week / Next week.

Schedule Management — a screen's weekly display schedule: display_on at 10:00, playlists during the day, display_off at 20:00

Each coloured block is one event, showing its time and what it does. In the example above, a screen turns on at 10:00 (green display_on), plays two playlists through the day, and turns off at 20:00 (red display_off) — every day of the week. Screens with nothing set show "No events found" and an Add new event link. For a fleet-wide view (several screens or a date range), see Viewing & managing device schedules.

The easy way — ask the assistant

The quickest way, and the one we recommend for most people, is to ask the assistant in plain words:

"turn the lobby screen on at 8 and off at 22" "weekdays 8–20, Saturday 10–16, off on Sunday"

It creates the repeating display_on and display_off events for you — nothing to fill in by hand.

The manual way — add the on/off events yourself

You can also add the two events by hand, in the Schedule Management calendar:

1. On a day with nothing on it, click Add new event. This opens the normal publish window — the same Action / When / Select devices window used to publish a playlist (see Put a playlist on your screens).

2. Turn the screen off at night:

   • Action — open the list and, under Device, choose display_off. Tip: you can also just start typing display in the field and pick the action from the filtered list.

     

     The publish window's Action field: type "display" to filter, then pick display_off (or display_on) from the DEVICE list

     
     

   • When — choose Recurrent → at a recurring fixed time, then set the time (e.g. 20:00) and, if you want, which weekdays.

   • Select devices — tick the screen.

   • Publish.

3. Turn the screen on in the morning: repeat, but choose display_on and the morning time (e.g. 10:00).

Those two repeating events are the screen's working hours; they now appear as blocks in the weekly calendar — a green display_on in the morning and a red display_off at night:

The weekly calendar: a green display_on at 10:00 and a red display_off at 20:00 each day (playlists play in between).

Colours are automatic. Each block's colour is generated from the item itself, so it's essentially random — it only helps you tell different playlists and commands apart. Don't read any meaning into a particular colour.

Change or remove an event

In the weekly calendar, hover the mouse over an event to reveal two buttons:

• Pencil — edit it (reopens the publish window so you can change the time or action).

• Trash — delete it (you'll be asked to confirm first).

  

  Hovering an event reveals its delete (trash) and edit (pencil) buttons

  
  

Different hours on different days

Because each turn-on / turn-off is its own repeating event, you can give days different hours — for example weekdays 08:00–20:00, Saturday 10:00–16:00, closed on Sunday. The simplest way is one sentence to the assistant ("weekdays 8–20, Saturday 10–16, off on Sunday"). By hand, set the weekdays on each event's recurring pattern.

Days with no turn-on or turn-off event are left alone — that's how you keep a screen off all day (for example, simply don't add any event for Sunday).

Examples

• Shop open 9–6: display_on 09:00, display_off 18:00.

• Evening lobby: display_on 07:00, display_off 00:00 (midnight).

• 24/7 screen: don't add a display schedule at all.

Midnight: enter it as 00:00. If you think of the end of the day as "24:00", still enter 00:00.

One-off change

A display schedule repeats every day. For a single change today — close early, a one-off event — use the manual Display on/off command instead: see Turn a screen on or off.

Tips

• The schedule belongs to one specific screen — add its events in the Schedule Management calendar.

• Combine working hours with scheduled publishing and content dates for full campaign control — see Scheduling overview.