How Long Do MLB Games Last in the Pitch Clock Era?

For decades the average MLB game crept past three hours. The pitch clock introduced in 2023 — 15 seconds between pitches with bases empty, 20 with runners on — cut the average nine-inning game to about 2 hours 40 minutes, the fastest baseball since the 1980s.

A game still has no fixed length: nine innings take as long as they take. But the spread has narrowed. Most games now land between 2:20 and 3:00, and genuinely slow four-hour games have become rare outside the postseason, where longer commercial breaks and pitching changes stretch things back out.

Regular-season games tied after nine innings use the automatic-runner rule: each half-inning starts with a runner on second base, which resolves most games within an inning or two. Postseason games play traditional extra innings without the free runner, which is how October classics occasionally run past five hours.

MLB start times cluster around 13:00 and 19:00 US local time. For European fans that means evening starts around 19:00 CET for day games, or 01:00 CET for night games. With 15 games most days across six time zones, a local-time schedule with countdowns is the practical way to catch first pitch of the game you actually care about.