19 best social media scheduling tools in 2024

What is a social media scheduler?

It’s a scheduling tool that automates your posting across various social networks. It lets you plan, schedule, and manage posts in advance, ensuring a consistent online presence even when you’re busy with other things and optimizing engagement through strategic timing.

Why are social media schedulers essential?

Google updates have led many creators to look for other ways to gain traffic. Social media is an obvious first choice.

Of course, if you’re trying out Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok simultaneously to see what sticks, that’s a huge time commitment. Enter social media posting platforms, which allow you to publish content across multiple social media accounts simultaneously (“cross-posting”). With key features like bulk scheduling and an integrated editor, you can ensure polished content and posts reach your audience at the best time for maximum engagement.

What features should you look for when choosing a scheduling tool?

• Content calendar: A visual overview used to plan, organize, and track your posts. It helps ensure consistent publishing, allowing you to create and schedule posts in advance.
• Collaboration tools: Essential for teams, these tools enable multiple users to work together. Collaboration features streamline the process of planning, editing, and approving posts. This is a plus if you’re working with assistants. 
• Cross-platform scheduling: This feature allows you to schedule posts to multiple platforms simultaneously, saving time and ensuring consistency across all your social media accounts.
• Automated content publishing: You can schedule it and forget it, even if you’re offline. This is the best way to keep your presence consistent.
• Feed previews: Particularly important for Instagram, a feed preview lets you see how your posts will look before they go live. This helps ensure a cohesive and visually appealing layout.
• Social listening: This feature lets you monitor conversations and mentions of your brand or specific keywords across social media. This can help you engage with your audience more effectively and stay on top of trends.
• Hashtags and keyword suggestions: Some tools suggest the best options to boost your visibility and help your content reach more people.

Analytics and reporting: Many tools offer easy-to-read reports on what’s working and what’s not. It’s like having your own coach for social media, guiding you to smarter strategies.

Best free scheduling tools

AgoraPulse 

AgoraPulse is a social networking and CRM platform for agencies.It works with Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Instagram, and LinkedIn and has tools for collaborating and analyzing your effectiveness.

Positives:

• Published material can be tagged and easily analyzed
• Discover what your audience is saying about your brand and competitors with the Listening feature

Drawbacks:

• Its user interface (UI) can be difficult to navigate

Price:

Additionally, you can try out the Pro and Premium plans for free for 30 days.

Buffer

Known for its intuitive interface, Buffer lets you schedule social media posts in a few clicks. It offers numerous analytical features and even strategies for boosting social presence.

Positives:

• Simple and intuitive UI
• Publishing and planning assistance on popular social networks
• Mobile app

Drawbacks:

• No support of paid advertising options
• More advanced features only in paid plans

Price:

You can try the Essentials package for free for 14 days.

Crowdfire

Crowdfire is a straightforward scheduler with a content discovery feature, which curates relevant articles and posts from across the web tailored to the user’s interests and audience.

Positives:

• Simple scheduling options
• Engagement and follower growth recommendations

Drawbacks:

• Limited options for synchronizing accounts
• Limited features in the basic plan
• Scheduling calendar views are only available in Premium

Price:

Friends+Me

Friends+me is a simple, straightforward scheduler that integrates with Google+ and major social networks.

Positives:

• Free version works with all major social networks minus Pinterest

Drawbacks:

• No customization

Price:

You can try any plan for free for 15 days.

Later 

Later is convenient for scheduling publications, video clips, and stories on various services like Twitter, Pinterest, and Facebook.

Positives:

• Timeline preview on Instagram

Drawbacks:

• Good core product, but no bells and whistles
• Limit of 30 free posts per month
• Analytical instruments are limited

Price:

All plans come with a free trial period of 14 days.

Meta Business Suite

This is a powerful, free tool designed to help users seamlessly manage their Facebook and Instagram presence. It provides a centralized platform to schedule content, manage ad campaigns, and analyze performance.

Positives:

• Visual planner for scheduled posts on Facebook and Instagram
• Detailed analytics
• Integrated ad management

Drawbacks:

• Limited to Facebook and Instagram
• Extensive features may be overwhelming for beginners

Monday.com 

Monday is a project management service for teams that includes a social media organizer. 

Positives:

• Visual boards and color-coded alerts provide great tracking features
• Offers a timeline view, a Kanban board, and a calendar view
• A valuable resource for communicating

Drawbacks:

• The platform can be complex for new users
• Difficult to track project goals

Price:

You can try the Standard and Pro plans for 14 days for free.

Social Champ

Social Champ lets you manage all aspects of social media, from interacting with your followers to planning posts.

Positives:

• Allows connecting many social networking profiles
• Allows reusing published posts
• Provides recommendations on what to write

Drawbacks:

• Some features aren’t supported for all social networks
• Stories and IGTV are unavailable
• No hashtag or advanced timing suggestions

Price:

You can try the paid plans for seven days for free.

Social Oomph

SocialOomph offers special features for Twitter but is also compatible with social networks like Discord, Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Reddit, etc.

Positives:

• Respond automatically to new followers
• Keyword research for your company, products, and niche
• Identify targeted Twitter users for following

Drawbacks:

• No Instagram support
• No email or phone customer support

Price:

You can try the Business Suite for free for 30 days.

TweetDeck 

If Twitter is your main hangout, this is the scheduling software for you.

Positives:

• Completely free
• Intuitive interface
• Customization of updates, replies, and interactions
• Extensive search tools, including filters and auto-suggestions

Drawbacks:

• Only for Twitter
• No statistics for marketing campaigns
• 5 MB limit for pictures
• No option for managing ads

Best paid scheduling tools

Coschedule

CoSchedule offers advanced features such as integration with popular CMSes like WordPress, Evernote, and Google Analytics.

Positives:

• Design templates
• Automated processes and engagement features
• Integrations with WordPress and other CMSes

Drawbacks:

• A little pricey
• Website is full of pop-ups
• Scheduler doesn’t support Pinterest

Price:

The trial period is 14 days.

Hootsuite

Hootsuite offers post planning, post management, and ROI tracking. It integrates with various external apps, such as Google Translate, Notion, Salesforce, and many more.

Positives:

• Full suite of tools for posting
• Supports most social networks
• Advertisement options and social media optimization

Drawbacks:

• Somewhat complicated interface
• Doesn’t support resharing or retweeting
• Several users have reported difficulty working with stories in Hootsuite

Price:

Both Professional and Team plans include a free trial period of 30 days.

MeetEdgar

MeetEdgar is a fairly bare-bones scheduler, though it includes some AI-driven content features like a variation generator. 

Positives:

• Weekly progress reports
• Excellent library of already published content with great categorization

Drawbacks:

• Lack of in-depth analytics
• No YouTube integration, limited Instagram functionality

Price:

The trial period is seven days.

Planable

Planable is a user-friendly social media post tool designed above all for teams working together to manage various social media accounts.

Positives:

• Planner offers calendar, grid, list, and feed views to help visualize, publish, and organize your posts
• Tools for collaboration: in-context comments, multi-level approvals, and customizable permissions
• A built-in media library for easy access to shared assets

Drawbacks:

• Lacks advanced analytics and social listening features
• Bulk scheduling lacks customization for different platforms
• Some users say the calendar view can get cluttered

Price:

Post Planner 

Post Planner is a social media management and scheduling tool aimed especially at small businesses and marketing agencies.

Positives:

• Supports multiple platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, Pinterest, and TikTok
• Allows recycling of evergreen content
• User-friendly interface

Drawbacks:

• Limited advanced analytics
• Interface can be difficult to navigate, especially after updates
• Bulk scheduling lacks customization for different platforms

Price:

Sendible

Sendible was designed to be an all-in-one social media marketing service. In addition to its content calendar and publishing tools, it offers brand monitoring and user engagement features.

Positives:

• Customer engagement
• Brand monitoring
• Stats on social networking sites

Drawbacks:

• Gathering brand mentions via online monitoring is time-consuming
• No options for tagging, and limited analytics capabilities
• Constant reconnection of profiles have been reported by some users

Price:

A 14-day trial period is available for all plans.

SocialBee

SocialBee is a social media scheduling tool for businesses, agencies, and bloggers.

Positives:

• Supports Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and other social media platforms
• Offers content categorization (organizing posts by type)
• Allows recycling of evergreen content
• Many different integrations and built-in AI tools 

Drawbacks:

• Occasional slowdowns with media uploads
• UX for the calendar could be improved

Price:

A 14-day free trial period is also available for all plans.

Social Pilot

This social media posting service offers a brand-customizable white label product, advanced Facebook features, and tools for collaboration.

Positives:

• Organizing images in bulk

Drawbacks:

• No Instagram analytics
• Interface has been criticized by many users
• Users are not impressed with analytic features

Price:

All plans include a free 14-day trial period.

Zoho Social

Zoho Social is a user-friendly service that integrates with Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Positives:

• Excellent client assistance
• Easily navigable
• Each package includes a CRM toolkit

Drawbacks:

• IGTV and stories are unavailable
• Analytics aren’t as accurate as competitors

Price:

All plans include a 15-day trial period.

Comparing the top scheduling tools

Whichever service you choose, may it reduce your stress and boost your blog! Any thoughts on a service we feature here, or know of one we skipped? Let us know in the comments.