Start focusing
Press Start, or the Space key.
The timer counts down a Focus session (25 minutes unless you change it). While it runs, only the minutes stay on screen; move the mouse or touch the screen to show the pause and skip buttons. Press Space again to pause or resume. Space does what it usually does while you type in a field or while Settings or the menu is open.
On a computer, the button next to Settings, or the F key, goes full screen: only the scene and the timer are left. Press F or Esc to come back.
The button at the right end of Start switches between sitting and standing: your report keeps the two apart. If you never work standing, Settings can hide it.
Let the camera press Start
Presence (Premium, experimental) starts Focus when you sit down and pauses it when you leave.
Switch it on from Presence in the tool bar, or under Camera in Settings. Your browser asks for the camera once. When you have been at your desk for 30 seconds, the timer says so and counts down 10 seconds before Focus starts; Not now cancels, Start now skips the wait. Leave for 30 seconds while Focus runs and it pauses; come back, and after another 30 seconds it counts down and resumes. A pause you pressed yourself is left alone, and Move and the breaks are never watched: leaving the desk is what they are for.
Your face, or your upper body when you turn to a second screen or look down, is detected right in the browser, on your device. No video is recorded or sent anywhere, and the detector is downloaded only when you switch Presence on. It is for computers with a camera; phones don't show it yet. Keep the tab open: a tab the browser has stopped drawing can't see you, so it neither starts nor pauses anything.
Focus, Move and Break
Each Focus is followed by a short Move, then a Break.
After Focus comes Move: a minute of gentle stretching at your desk. Then a Break (5 minutes), and after every 4 Focus sessions a Long break (10 minutes). The little tomatoes under the stage name count the Focus sessions until the long break.
To jump to another stage, click its name (on a phone, tap it, or swipe it left or right). Move and the breaks also have Skip, next to Start: it goes on to the next stage, and the skipped one is not counted in Today. Settings sets the lengths: pick a common rule (25/5, 40/5, 50/10, 52/17 or 90/20) or type your own.
Rush (in the tool bar) skips the breaks when you need to keep going: after Focus and Move, the next Focus starts. Move stays, so you still stand up.
Moving between sessions
Follow the short video; the steps move along with the timer.
During Move, a card shows a short stretching video and one step at a time. Use ‹ › to go back or forward, “All steps” for the whole list, and “–” to hide the card (“Show the exercise” brings it back). The moves are gentle stretches for a desk break: do only what feels comfortable, and stop if anything hurts.
Moving often matters as much as focusing: it breaks up long sitting, rests your eyes and clears your head before the next session.
Scenes and music
Choose a scene from Scene in the tool bar; play music from Music.
The scenes are calm photos picked to help you settle into work: mountains, the sea, a plane window. Premium adds slow looping videos (among them Chishang, in Taiwan: its rice fields seen from above, drawn from OpenStreetMap, where now and then a small plane or a few egrets pass over), Live sky: clouds drawn in your browser as they drift, lit by where the sun is for you right now (and on dark nights, the Milky Way where it really is), Black hole: a black hole whose glowing disk turns slowly around it, and Thunderhead: a storm cloud at dusk under the first stars, lightning glowing softly inside it now and then. These three are offered where your device has the graphics to draw them; if one turns out too slow, it holds still and the timer tells you, so you can choose another scene. And Shirakawa-go, in Japan, as pixel art: the snowy village at blue hour seen from far above, its windows lit, snow falling and stars twinkling.
Music plays a Spotify playlist or a YouTube video or playlist: pick the source under “Play with”. Nothing from Spotify or YouTube loads until you press Play. Switch on “Play and pause with the timer” to have the music follow the timer.
To use your own Spotify playlist:
- In the Spotify app, open the playlist, choose ⋯ → Share.
- Hold Option (Mac) or Alt (Windows) and choose “Copy Spotify URI”.
- Paste it in Settings → Music (“Change” in the Music panel opens it).
Without signing in to Spotify, songs play as 30-second previews: sign in at open.spotify.com, then reload Pomodoroll.
To play from YouTube:
- In Settings → Music, choose YouTube.
- On YouTube, open the video or playlist and choose Share → Copy. Any link works: a watch link, a youtu.be link, a playlist link.
- Paste it in the “YouTube video or playlist” field. The title appears once Pomodoroll has checked it.
YouTube’s own player plays it, with YouTube’s controls. Ads are YouTube’s: with a YouTube Premium login in this browser there are none. Videos whose owner doesn’t allow playing outside YouTube can’t be played here.
Sounds and notifications
A sound plays when a stage ends; notifications can tell you too.
Settings sets the sounds and their volume for the end of Focus and of breaks. Switch on notifications there (your browser asks for permission once) to be told when Focus, a Break or a Long break ends, even while you work in another tab.
Today and your report
Today in the tool bar; the full report from the chart button at the top right.
Today counts what you have done since this morning: focus sitting and standing, moves and breaks. It is kept on this device until you reload.
The Report (the chart button at the top right) needs an account: today’s focus, your streaks, a calendar of the last months and your minutes by week, month or year, including which body parts you moved.
How streaks are counted
A streak grows by one for each day you finish a Focus session (or a Move, for the Move streak). Weekends don’t break it: if you stop on Friday and come back on Monday, the streak goes on.
Install the app
Menu → Install app.
Installed, Pomodoroll opens from your home screen or dock without the browser’s address bar, works offline once you have opened it, and keeps the screen on while the timer runs. On an iPhone or iPad, the menu shows the steps (Share → Add to Home Screen).
Webhooks
Send the timer’s start, pause and end to Make, IFTTT, Zapier or your own service.
- Get a webhook URL from Make, IFTTT or Zapier.
- Paste it on your profile under Webhook, and choose which stages send events.
- Build your flow there, for example: set your Slack status to “Do not disturb” while you focus.
Each event is a POST with a JSON body like this:
{
"type": "pomodoro", // pomodoro (Focus), exercise (Move), shortbreak, longbreak
"event": "start", // start, pause or end
"remainingTime": 1500, // seconds left
"passedTime": 0, // seconds gone
"standing": true, // Focus only: standing or sitting
"timezoneOffset": 480, // your time zone, in minutes
"time": "2026-10-18 20:05:38", // your local time
"ts": 1792239938637 // Unix time, in milliseconds
}Site blocker extension
Block distracting sites while you focus, with Pomodoroll Ex for Chrome.
Install Pomodoroll Exand add the sites you want blocked: it follows your Pomodoroll timer and blocks them while you focus. The video shows the steps.
Need help?
Write to [email protected] or use the contact form.