Stories posted Monday 06:00 UTC end up with the highest point yield — 292 net points per story — but Wednesday wins the week overall

Asked:

“When are the most "points/upvotes" "generated" in a week, similar to before? Basically, calculate what the rate of upvote/points is for the submissions on the frontpage for a weekday, then show what day of the week/per hour, has the highest rate of points/votes generation essentially.”

67,544 Hacker News stories submitted 1 January 2025 – 2 September 2026 that reached a final score of at least 30 (a front-page-caliber proxy), carrying 14.3 million gross score points. Each story is grouped by its submission weekday and UTC hour; the metric is net points (score minus the automatic first point) per qualifying story.

Proxy, not a vote clock: the Hacker News API stores only a story’s current score, not when each vote was cast, and historical front-page membership is not recorded. So these numbers measure the eventual point yield of stories by the time they were submitted — not the hour the votes happened, and not proof any given story hit the front page. A true vote-generation clock would need repeated front-page snapshots with score deltas.

Net points per qualifying story, by submission weekday × UTC hour

Weekday totals: Wednesday, Thursday and Tuesday within 1.2 points of each other

What the heatmap can’t say alone

The Monday 06:00 UTC peak (292.00) rests on just 215 stories — the busiest top cells like Tuesday 15:00 (809 stories) and Wednesday 16:00 (798) carry three to four times the sample. play.clickhouse.com
The weakest cell is Sunday 02:00 UTC at 135.86 net points per story (232 stories) — the peak yields roughly 2.1× as much per story. play.clickhouse.com
By whole weekday, Wednesday leads at 221.26 net points per story, ahead of Thursday (220.10) and Tuesday (220.06); Saturday trails at 191.64. play.clickhouse.com
The US-afternoon band, 14:00–18:00 UTC on weekdays, holds 10 of the 15 highest-yield cells — the reliable high-yield window. play.clickhouse.com

Top 15 weekday-hour cells by point yield

#WeekdayUTC hourPoints / storyStoriesNet pointsSource
1Monday06:00–06:59292.0021562,780play.clickhouse.com
2Tuesday15:00–15:59267.22809216,179play.clickhouse.com
3Thursday16:00–16:59258.28717185,186play.clickhouse.com
4Thursday17:00–17:59254.90633161,354play.clickhouse.com
5Tuesday18:00–18:59250.47709177,584play.clickhouse.com
6Monday10:00–10:59246.8734284,431play.clickhouse.com
7Wednesday14:00–14:59245.25758185,896play.clickhouse.com
8Tuesday17:00–17:59244.15769187,748play.clickhouse.com
9Wednesday15:00–15:59244.08794193,803play.clickhouse.com
10Wednesday16:00–16:59243.91798194,640play.clickhouse.com
11Friday15:00–15:59242.18730176,791play.clickhouse.com
12Wednesday17:00–17:59241.82683165,163play.clickhouse.com
13Wednesday19:00–19:59240.73580139,621play.clickhouse.com
14Tuesday11:00–11:59239.5439995,577play.clickhouse.com
15Thursday18:00–18:59239.41679162,558play.clickhouse.com

Source: ClickHouse public playground, hackernews_history table, queried via SQL (links above). Filter: type='story', score ≥ 30, submitted 2025-01-01 through 2026-09-02 (2026 year-to-date). 67,544 qualifying stories; 168 weekday×hour cells; net points = max(score−1, 0). Points/story is eventual yield by submission time, not the hour votes were cast; front-page membership is approximated by the score threshold. Cells below the top 15 appear only in the heatmap for space.

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