How to Add a Countdown Timer to Your Klaviyo Emails

Why Klaviyo Needs a Third-Party Timer

Adding a countdown timer to an email is one of the fastest ways to build urgency for a flash sale or product drop. The problem is that Klaviyo does not have a native countdown block in its template editor.

For the next step, see Where to add SMS into your Klaviyo automated flows.

If you look at the drag-and-drop menu in Klaviyo, you get text, images, buttons, and drop shadows, but no timer tool. To get an animated, ticking timer inside your campaigns, you need to generate one outside Klaviyo and drop it in using raw HTML.

It sounds technical, but it takes less than two minutes once you know where to go.

Choosing Sendtric for Email Timers

My team and I use a tool called Sendtric. It is not a sponsored mention, and they have no idea who I am. The main reason I like it is simple: it is straightforward and costs around $9 a month on the standard plan.

You do not need an overpriced software suite just to show a ticking clock. For most ecommerce stores, you only need timers during peak promotion windows like Black Friday or short 48-hour flash sales.

That makes cheap, standalone tools the obvious choice in my books.

Setting Up Standard vs Dynamic Timers

When you build a timer in Sendtric, you have two primary options depending on the type of email you are sending:

• Standard Timers: These count down to a fixed date and time for everyone on your list. This is what you want for a Black Friday sale ending on the 1st of December at 11:59 PM EST.
• Dynamic Timers: These count down relative to when the recipient triggers the message, such as giving a subscriber exactly 24 hours to use an abandoned cart discount code.

For standard campaign blasts, select your target time zone, pick your expiry date, and generate the baseline preview.

Customising the Look and Alignment

Before grabbing the code, you need to match the timer styling to your email template. If your email has a clean white background, a default black timer box will look disjointed.

In the visual design settings, adjust your background colour, digit colour, and label text to fit your brand palette. You can switch the background to transparent or pure white, set the digits to black, and tweak the labels for days, hours, minutes, and seconds.

Make sure you also set the alignment (left, centre, or right) inside the tool so it renders neatly inside your layout columns.

Embedding the HTML Block in Klaviyo

Once you are happy with the visual setup, hit save and copy the generated HTML snippet. Head over to your email draft in Klaviyo and follow these steps:

• Drag an HTML block into your email layout where you want the timer to appear.
• Paste the code snippet directly into the block editor.
• Save the block and preview the template.

The timer will load instantly and start counting down dynamically every time a subscriber opens the email. You can also monitor total opens and timer views inside your Sendtric dashboard, which is a nice sanity check during heavy campaign volume.

Final Thoughts

You do not need complex custom development to add urgency to your promotional campaigns. Spend five minutes setting up an external tool, match the styling to your branding, and drop the HTML code straight into Klaviyo. It is reliable, low-cost, and drives immediate action.

For the next step, see How to Add 20% More Revenue with 8 Campaigns a Month.

Work With In-box

If you want help designing high-converting promotions or setting up automated revenue engines, take a look at our email campaigns service to see how we help ecommerce brands scale.

For the next step, see How to Use AI to Design High-Converting Email Header Images.