How presales work, market by market

Practical guide

Presale Day Checklist 2027: The Hour-by-Hour Plan

Presale day rewards preparation far more than reflexes. The fans who come away with tickets are rarely the fastest clickers; they are the ones whose password worked first time, whose bank approved the payment without a fuss, who knew the exact opening time in their own time zone and who had already decided which seats they would accept. This checklist turns that preparation into a timeline you can follow, starting a week before the sale and finishing after the confirmation email lands. It works for any kind of early window, whether you are using a fan club login, an artist sign-up, a card, a mobile network app or a promoter newsletter, and it applies equally to the general sale if that is your only route. Nothing here can guarantee a ticket, since demand for some tours far exceeds supply, but every step removes a common, avoidable reason for failure on the morning that matters.

The plan is deliberately concrete. Each stage lists what to check, what to decide and what to leave alone, with notes on phones, computers, accounts, cards and time zones. You will notice that much of the work happens days before the queue opens, because problems discovered at the last minute are the hardest to fix. The busiest sale mornings also tend to come in clusters: in the 2027 tour data we track, general sales overwhelmingly fall on Fridays, with early windows in English-speaking markets often on the Tuesday or Wednesday before, so a single week can contain several important mornings. If you are following more than one tour, run the checklist once for the week and then adapt it for each sale. And if a term in the plan is unfamiliar, the glossary explains it in a sentence or two.

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Seven days before presale day: accounts and registrations

The week before is for anything that might need a reply from a human or a system. Start by reading the full announcement for the tour and listing every early window it mentions, with its condition and deadline. Register for the ones you qualify for today, not tomorrow. Then work through your accounts. Log in to every platform that sells the shows you want; in Australia and New Zealand that may mean Ticketek, Ticketmaster and AXS, while in Germany it is often Eventim and Ticketmaster. Reset any forgotten password, confirm your email address and phone number, and check that your billing address matches the address your bank holds. If a platform offers two-step verification, enable it now and make sure the codes arrive on the phone you will be holding. Finally, update the apps on your phone, since an update notice in the middle of a queue is the last thing you want.

  1. List every window named in the announcement, with its conditions, deadline and opening time in local time.
  2. Register for each window you genuinely qualify for, using the account and phone number you will buy with.
  3. Log in to each relevant platform, reset passwords, verify contact details and enable any security steps.
  4. Check that your card is valid beyond the sale date, that its limit can cover the order, and that your banking app approves online payments.
  5. Agree with friends who is buying which tickets, so that nobody exceeds the per-person limit stated in the terms.

The evening before presale day

The night before is for decisions, not for discovery. By now your accounts should work and your registrations should be confirmed, so use the evening to settle the questions that will otherwise cost you minutes in the basket. Which date and city do you want first, and which is your fallback? What is your maximum total budget, including fees? Will you accept seats behind the stage, restricted views or standing tickets, and how many tickets do you need? Write these answers down. Then check your inbox, including spam and promotions folders, for access codes, invitations or links from the official channels you registered with. Many arrive the evening before, and some are only valid for a particular show or time slot. Charge your devices, check your home connection, and set two alarms: one forty-five minutes before the opening and one fifteen minutes before. An early night helps, especially for morning sales.

Converting time zones before presale day

Time zones cause more missed windows than almost anything else, and the risk rises when tours sell in several countries or cities. Announcements give opening times in local time for each sale, and on national tours in North America and Australia each city may open at the same local hour in its own zone. That means a tour opening at 10am locally will release Toronto, Chicago and Vancouver tickets at different moments. Clock changes add another trap: Europe and North America move their clocks on different dates in spring and autumn, so the usual gap between London and New York shrinks for a few weeks each year. The southern hemisphere changes in the opposite direction. Always convert the stated time using a reliable world clock on the day you plan, and write the converted time next to the original in your notes, so you can see both at a glance on presale day itself.

Once converted, double-check with a second method, such as your phone's world clock set to the city of the sale. If you are buying in another country, note whether your bank will see the transaction as foreign and whether it needs an approval in its app. For lottery-style sales, notably in Japan, the time that matters is the end of the entry period and the result date rather than an opening minute, and both should be converted in the same way. If a sale opens in the middle of your night, decide in advance whether you will genuinely wake up for it, and if not, whether a trusted friend in a better time zone can buy on your behalf within the platform's rules. A clear decision made the day before is better than an alarm switched off in your sleep. Our country comparison lists the usual opening habits in each market.

Devices and connections for presale day

The right setup is simple: one account per device, a stable connection and as few distractions as possible. Many platforms detect unusual activity, such as the same account open in many tabs or on several devices at once, and may slow down or remove sessions that look automated. Running two or three devices can make sense if they belong to different people with their own accounts and their own eligibility, coordinated so they do not overbuy. A wired or strong home connection is preferable to public wi-fi, and a mobile data connection on your phone makes a useful backup if the home network falters. Disable virtual private networks, which can trigger security checks or place you in the wrong region. Close bandwidth-hungry apps like video streaming or large downloads on your network. Keep a pen and your written plan within reach, because switching windows to read notes is a small but real distraction in the basket.

Using a phone app on presale day

Ticketing apps are often the most stable way to buy, and some early windows, such as network-based ones like O2 Priority, are delivered entirely in the partner's app. Update the app the day before and log in so you are not entering passwords at the last moment. Turn on notifications for the app, since some platforms announce your turn in the queue with an alert. Switch your phone to do-not-disturb mode, allowing only the ticketing app and your bank's app, which may need to approve the payment. Keep the screen awake by adjusting the auto-lock setting, and plug the phone into a charger. If the platform requires facial or fingerprint confirmation for payments, make sure it works with the card you intend to use. Finally, have your card details or digital wallet ready, because typing a sixteen-digit number on a small screen under a timer is a recipe for mistakes on presale day.

Using a laptop or desktop on presale day

A computer offers a bigger seat map and easier typing, which helps when choosing among many sections. Use an up-to-date mainstream browser, clear any problematic extensions, and allow cookies for the ticketing site, since queues and baskets rely on them. Log in to your account before the queue opens and keep a single tab for each sale. Avoid browser auto-refresh tools, which can be treated as automated behaviour and are pointless in a managed waiting room. If the platform uses a security check such as a puzzle or verification step, complete it carefully; repeated failures can slow you down. Keep your bank's app on your phone nearby for payment approvals. Some fans run the app on their phone and the website on their computer under different accounts belonging to different household members. That is fine if each person qualifies and buys within their own limit, but never run one account on several devices in parallel.

The hour before presale day opens

Use the last hour to arrive calm, not to fix things. Around forty-five minutes before opening, sit down with your devices, your written plan and your payment method. Log in to the platform and navigate to the event page, or open the partner app if your window runs there. Recheck the official announcement or the platform's event page for any last-minute change to the opening time. If you received a code, copy it into a note so you can paste it rather than type it. Around fifteen to twenty minutes before the opening, join the waiting room if the platform opens it early; on many platforms, everyone in the waiting room when the sale starts is randomised together, so there is no benefit in joining much earlier and a clear cost in joining late. From this point, stop browsing social media for rumours, which tend to spread panic rather than information during the final minutes before presale day begins.

  1. Forty-five minutes before: devices on charge, plan on paper, payment method ready, notifications silenced.
  2. Thirty minutes before: log in to each account and open the event page or partner app.
  3. Twenty minutes before: reread the official opening time and any access instructions.
  4. Fifteen minutes before: join the waiting room if available, then leave the page alone.

The opening minute and the queue on presale day

When the sale opens, the waiting room usually converts into a queue and shows an estimated position or wait. Resist the urge to refresh: on most platforms that sends you back to the end. Keep the page in the foreground, keep the device awake and stay near it, since some queues admit you without warning and give only a short time to start selecting seats. Position estimates can move, both forward and backwards, as people drop out or as the platform adjusts batch sizes; treat them as a rough guide. If you are on a phone app, check that notifications are working. If an error appears, read it carefully and follow its instructions, rather than opening a fresh session elsewhere. In high-demand sales, it is normal to wait an hour or more, so have water nearby. When you reach the front, the clock starts: from this point, you will be working from the plan you wrote the night before.

Queues also reveal how the stack of windows interacts on presale day. If you qualify for an early window, your queue may be shorter than the one for the general sale, but the allocation is limited and may run out before you reach the front. If the platform tells you that tickets in your window are no longer available, check whether other ticket types, such as standing or premium packages, remain, and whether another date or city is still selling. Sometimes unpaid baskets release seats back after a few minutes, so a show that looks sold out early may briefly reappear. Do not buy something you did not plan for just because the timer is running; there may be later windows, extra dates or official resale options. Our queue explainer describes waiting room mechanics in more detail, including why the numbers on screen sometimes jump around.

Basket and payment on presale day

Once admitted, work through your plan in order. Select the date, the number of tickets and the area you decided on; if the platform offers a best-available option, it can be quicker than browsing the map, but check what it gives you. Read the ticket type label: standard, premium, package, restricted view or dynamically priced seats can sit side by side, and the cheapest-looking option is not always the one you expect. Watch the basket timer, which typically gives you a few minutes to complete payment. Enter any attendee names exactly as on identity documents when the sale requires named tickets, as for large concerts in Italy. Review the total, including fees, before confirming; many markets now require the full price to be shown up front, which makes this check easier. Approve the payment in your banking app promptly when asked, then wait for the confirmation screen without closing or refreshing the page.

After presale day: confirmation, transfers and plan B

If you succeeded, check your confirmation email and the tickets section of your account. On many tours the tickets appear in the app only closer to the event, sometimes with a rotating barcode that activates a few days before; that is normal. Note any transfer restrictions in the terms, and if you bought for friends, plan when and how to transfer their tickets through the platform's official tool. Save a note of the order number, venue entry rules and any date by which named tickets can be changed. Then step back from further purchases for the same show, since buying more than the stated limit can lead to cancellations. If you did not succeed, do not despair. Many tours add dates when demand is high, later windows or the general sale may still offer tickets, and some markets have official resale tools with face-value rules. Keep your alerts switched on for that tour.

A short review afterwards makes the next presale day easier. Note what worked and what did not: was the bank approval slow, did a code arrive late, did a password reset prove necessary, did a device freeze? Fix those issues before the next big announcement rather than relying on memory. If you are following several tours, consider subscribing to alerts for each using the alert form on this page or by tapping 🔔 Alert me next to a tour in our tables, so you hear about sign-up deadlines in time. Our calendar overview shows when the busiest on-sale weeks tend to fall in each market, and the window overview explains each kind of early access. Finally, remember that our alerts never contain codes; they tell you when and where a window opens, and the access itself always comes from the official channel.

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Presale day FAQ

These are the questions people most often ask us in the days before a big sale, often in a rush, so the answers are deliberately direct. They complement the timeline above rather than repeating it, focusing on the dilemmas that arise in the moment: whether to use several devices, what to do if a payment fails, how to handle an access code that does not work, and whether it is worth staying in a queue that seems hopeless. As with everything on this site, official sale terms take precedence, and platforms sometimes change their queue or payment processes between tours, so read the instructions shown on screen during the sale itself. If you have a question that is not answered here, our main frequently asked questions page covers broader topics such as eligibility, resale, refunds and buying abroad in more depth, and the glossary explains the vocabulary used throughout this checklist.

Should I use several devices on presale day?

Only if each device runs a different account belonging to a different person who is genuinely eligible and who buys within their own limit. Running the same account on several devices or in many tabs rarely helps, because many platforms tie your queue position to your account or session, and duplicated activity can be flagged as suspicious, leading to slower service or removal from the queue. A household with two or three fans, each with an account, can coordinate sensibly: agree in advance who will buy for which show, and if one person gets through, the others stop to avoid exceeding limits. Using a phone app and a computer browser under different accounts also spreads the risk of a technical failure on one device. The goal is not to multiply chances artificially but to make sure that a frozen screen or a bad connection does not knock your group out of the running.

What if my payment fails on presale day?

Stay calm and act within the basket timer. First, check for a pending approval request in your banking app, since many failures are simply unapproved transactions. If the card was declined, try again once, checking the card number, expiry date, security code and billing address. If it fails again, switch to a second card or payment method you prepared in advance, if the window allows it; card windows may require the eligible card specifically. Avoid repeatedly retrying the same card, as banks may block it after several attempts. If the timer runs out, the seats return to the pool and you may need to search again, so move quickly but carefully. Once the sale is over, contact your bank to understand the decline and fix it before the next presale day. A short call to your bank in advance, warning of a large online transaction, can prevent this problem altogether.

My access code does not work on presale day. What now?

Check the basics first. Is the window actually open yet, given the time zone? Are you on the right event page, since codes are often valid only for a specific show or city? Is the code entered exactly, without extra spaces? Some codes are tied to a particular account or phone number, so make sure you are logged in with the details you used to register. If the code was sent by a fan club, card issuer, network or promoter, check their message for any extra instructions, such as a dedicated link. If it still fails, contact the channel that issued it, though support lines are busy during sales. Avoid trying codes found elsewhere, which may be tied to someone else's account and could breach the terms of sale. If nothing works, the next window or the general sale remains your route, and your plan B should already be written down.

Is it worth staying in the queue when presale day looks hopeless?

Often, yes, at least for a while. Queue estimates can be misleading, and positions move as people abandon the queue or are removed for suspicious behaviour. Even when a show is reported as sold out on social media, unpaid baskets can release tickets back to the pool in waves, and platforms sometimes release additional allocations held back for production or for later windows. If the platform itself displays a clear message that no tickets remain in your window, consider switching to another date or city that is still on sale, if your plan allows it. Weigh the time you can afford to spend: if you need to leave for work, a quick decision about your fallback is better than leaving the page unattended. Whatever happens, keep alerts on for that tour, because extra dates are frequently announced within days when demand is clearly high, and those new sales sometimes go first to fans who registered the first time round.