Planning a sale, product launch or webinar with Brevo? A countdown beside your offer makes its deadline or start time easy to spot. With CleverTimer, you can create an animated timer image and add it to your newsletter without writing code yourself.
We’ll cover creating the timer, checking Brevo’s image setting and adding the countdown using its image URL. Step 3 also includes an HTML alternative. Brevo was previously called Sendinblue; these steps refer to its current drag-and-drop email editor.
Why use a countdown in your Brevo newsletter?
If your offer ends on Sunday, readers should be able to see that deadline at a glance. A countdown draws attention to the time remaining and can remind interested readers to act before it runs out. Whether that leads to more clicks or purchases also depends on your offer and your audience.
A countdown can be useful for:
- Flash sales and discounts: Show when the advertised saving ends, including a Black Friday or Cyber Monday offer.
- Product launches and pre-orders: Count down to the launch or the pre-order deadline.
- Webinars and events: Make it clear whether the timer refers to registration closing or the event starting.
- Advent calendars and seasonal promotions: Highlight the deadline for each individual offer.
- Abandoned-cart reminders: Remind shoppers about a discount with a fixed expiry date. Opening the email does not start a new personal deadline for the timer described here.
For more campaign ideas and advice on measuring results, see our guide to email countdown timers in newsletters.
How to add a countdown timer to Brevo
Step 1: Create your countdown with CleverTimer
- Open the CleverTimer generator and set the end date, time and time zone.
- Choose a design, then adjust the colours and the language of the timer’s labels to suit your newsletter.
- Choose an Apple Mail fallback if you’d like to use one: “Show image” displays a fixed message with your text; “Hide” supplies a transparent replacement image. “Disabled” leaves the fallback switched off. Replacement images are used for requests identified as possible MPP activity.
- Click “Create timer”, enter your email address, accept the terms and agree to the use of your email address for activation. Request the six-digit activation code and enter it to create your timer. You don’t need an account.
- Copy the Timer URL. If you prefer the HTML method, copy the complete Timer HTML Code instead.
Step 2: Check Brevo’s image URL setting
Open Brevo’s campaign settings and go to Default Settings. Set “Hide Images URL” to “No” and save the setting.
Don’t skip this check: Brevo explicitly recommends this setting for externally generated dynamic images in its NiftyImages guide. For CleverTimer, too, the original image URL needs to remain the source. Check the result in a delivered test email.
Step 3: Insert the timer into your email template
- Open your campaign or template in Brevo’s email editor.
- Drag an Image block into place, for example between your offer and call-to-action button.
- Click the image block. In the left sidebar, paste your timer URL under Visual → Image URL. Use this field rather than the Content library. Brevo explains the process in its guide to inserting images from a URL.
- Adjust the width to suit your layout and add useful alt text, such as “Countdown to the registration deadline”. Make sure the digits are readable on a phone.
- If you want the timer to be clickable, add your offer’s address in the Link section. This destination is separate from the Image URL, which loads the timer image.
HTML alternative: Drag an HTML block into your template, open it and replace the sample content with the complete HTML code from CleverTimer. Save the change. Pasting only the timer URL into an HTML block is not enough.
Tip: For the image block, the timer URL is all you need. Don’t download the GIF and upload it to Brevo: that would reuse an already generated file, whose remaining time would not be recalculated by CleverTimer when requested later.
Before sending: check the deadline and display
Write the deadline as regular text beside the offer, for example: “Register by 27 November 2026 at 8 pm (CET).” Readers can then understand it even if images are blocked or the timer shows an older version. “Only six hours left!” may no longer be true when someone reads the message later.
CleverTimer calculates the time remaining when its server receives a request for the timer image. Email apps can display saved images instead. A GIF that is still animating is therefore not necessarily showing the current remaining time, and reopening the email does not force a fresh request.
- Check the delivered test email: Look at desktop and mobile layouts in the email apps your audience uses. Brevo’s preview alone isn’t enough. Open the email again later and check what appears after the deadline.
- Account for Apple Mail: Mail Privacy Protection can load images before the email is read. The optional fallbacks offer an alternative display for requests identified as possible MPP activity. They don’t prevent caching or guarantee detection of every Apple Mail user. Our guide to Apple Mail Privacy Protection and countdown timers explains the details.
- Seeing a still image? GIF animation may be disabled. Microsoft explains the relevant Outlook settings.
- Check the landing page: The offer, written deadline and countdown should agree. Once the deadline has passed, the landing page should make it clear that the promotion has ended.
- Compare results: Test the same campaign with and without a timer. Compare clicks and completed purchases or registrations instead of assuming that adding animation will increase sales.
Frequently asked questions
No. For the image block, paste the timer URL into the Image URL field. Alternatively, paste CleverTimer’s ready-made HTML code into an HTML block without writing it yourself.
First check the timer’s end date, time and time zone, as well as Brevo’s “Hide Images URL” setting. Use the original CleverTimer URL rather than an uploaded copy of the GIF. If the delivered email still shows an older time, the email app may be displaying a cached image. A correct preview in the editor does not rule this out.
Apple Mail can display the timer image. With Mail Privacy Protection enabled, however, an image version may have been loaded before the email is read. CleverTimer therefore offers an optional static message or transparent replacement image for requests identified as possible MPP activity. This does not restore a continuously updated countdown; the written deadline still matters.
CleverTimer is free. You don’t need an account; activate the timer with the six-digit code sent to you by email.
Prepare your next Brevo newsletter with a countdown
Set the deadline, choose a design and add the timer URL to Brevo. Once you’ve checked the image setting and the delivered test email, you can use the countdown alongside the written deadline in your campaign.