What is a 3 minute timer?
A 3 minute timer is an online countdown that runs for exactly 3 minutes and alerts you when it reaches zero. This one is already set when the page opens: press Start or the space bar and it counts down from 03:00, keeps exact time if you switch tabs or lock your phone, and rings until you stop it.
What 3 minutes is good for
Three minutes is the classic kitchen interval: most instant noodles cook in 3 minutes (check the packet — some Korean brands say 4:30), a soft-boiled egg dropped into boiling water is very runny at 3 minutes, and black tea steeps for 3 to 5 minutes. It is also the length of a professional boxing round and a common limit for a short speech or a toddler's time-out.
Start the timer the moment the water comes back to the boil or the tea hits the cup, and leave the phone where you can hear it; the alarm repeats until you stop it, so a missed first ring is not a problem.
Start it in one click
There is nothing to set: the time is loaded, the Start button has keyboard focus on a computer, and the alarm sound, volume and screen settings are remembered from your last visit. If you need a different length, type it into the hours, minutes and seconds boxes or pick another preset below the timer.
It keeps counting in a background tab
The end time is fixed the moment you press Start, so a slow or sleeping tab cannot make it late: whenever the page is drawn it recomputes the remaining time from the clock. The alarm is pre-scheduled on the browser's audio clock and backed by a system timer and a desktop notification, and if the device was asleep when the time came, the page rings as soon as you return and shows how long ago the 3 minutes ended. On iPhone keep the tab on screen, since Safari pauses hidden pages; Keep screen on, which is on by default on phones, prevents auto-lock while it runs.
Alarm, repeat and phone use
Choose Beep, Bell, Digital, Soft, Cuckoo, Chime, Pipe or None and set the volume; all but the cuckoo are generated in the browser and work offline, and the cuckoo is a short clip of about 65 KB fetched once and then kept by the browser. The alarm repeats until you press Stop alarm, Space or Esc, and gives up after 60 seconds. Android phones vibrate as well; iPhones on iOS 17 or later play it even with the silent switch on.
Need a slightly different time?
For a 4:30 noodle, start this timer and press +1 min, then let it run past zero for 30 seconds using the elapsed counter — or type 4:30 into the minutes box. The 1 minute timer and the 5 minute timer are the neighbouring presets.
Other time tools
For measuring how long something takes, use the stopwatch, which counts up and records laps. For the days and hours until a date, use the countdown. For alternating focus and break periods, the Pomodoro timer runs the whole cycle, and the interval timer repeats work and rest rounds for training. They all share this timer's clock engine, sounds and settings.