Schedule Bluesky posts: queue them, approve them, post on time

What you can post to Bluesky through overads

overads posts to Bluesky as the account you connect. Publishing to Bluesky involves no app review, so nothing on Bluesky's side has to approve overads before your first post goes out.

Connecting takes an app password. You make one in Bluesky, paste it into overads with your handle, and overads stores it encrypted. You can revoke it from Bluesky at any time, and your main password never changes hands.

Bluesky's developer docs say to log in with an app password rather than the main account password, and point apps with end-user login toward OAuth (Bluesky API docs). overads has Sign in with Bluesky built on that OAuth, but the deployed product does not hold the signing key it needs yet, so the app password is the way in today.

These are the rules overads applies to a Bluesky post. Limits are checked when you create or edit the post, so an over-limit post is refused at once with a sentence naming the cap, not at the scheduled minute:

• Characters: 300 graphemes. Bluesky counts user-perceived characters, so an emoji or a combined character counts once.
• Up to 4 images, or 1 mp4 video up to 100 MB and 3 minutes.
• A post embeds images or a video, never both; a list with both is refused with MEDIA_UNSUPPORTED in the flat channel-limit body.
• Video goes through Bluesky's video service and is processed before the post is created, so a video post can take a minute to land.
• Links, mentions and hashtags in the text are turned into rich-text facets automatically.

The 300 is Bluesky's own: its post schema caps the text at 300 graphemes (app.bsky.feed.post). Bluesky also asks a Bluesky-hosted account to verify its email before it uploads video, and limits how many video posts an account makes a day (Uploading Video).

overads has no per-post Bluesky settings, so a scheduled post goes out as a new top-level post: replies, quote posts and threads are not something overads schedules on Bluesky. The Bluesky platform page lists the connection details.

How approval works on a scheduled Bluesky post

An approval step holds a scheduled Bluesky post until a teammate says yes. There are two ways to turn it on, and either one holds the post the same way:

• Per post: switch on approval in the composer when you schedule it. Use this when one post needs a second pair of eyes.
• For the whole workspace: an owner or admin turns on Settings > Rules > Require approval. Every scheduled post then waits, whether you wrote it in the app, the assistant drafted it or a workflow made it, and the composer shows the switch on and locked.

A held post stays scheduled in the approval queue; the scheduler does not deliver it until a member approves it in the app, and it cannot be published early to skip the step. You can edit it while it waits. A member approves in the app; the API and MCP server can create a held post but cannot approve one. Posts that overads workflows draft wait for approval by default. The full rules, including the webhooks that fire when a post enters the queue and when it is approved, are in Scheduling and approvals.

Bluesky's own scheduling options

Bluesky's app documents no way to schedule a post. In January 2026 Bluesky wrote that basic features like drafts were still missing, that four photos and three-minute videos were not enough, and that threads should be easier to create (What's Next at Bluesky). None of the posts on the Bluesky blog since, through October 22, 2026, announces a scheduler.

Bluesky has pointed people to outside tools: in July 2024 it announced a partnership with Buffer for scheduling and cross-posting (Schedule and Cross-Post with Buffer). The protocol has no publish-later field either. A post's only time is createdAt, which the schema describes as a client-declared timestamp of when the post was created (app.bsky.feed.post), so any scheduler has to hold the post and write it at the time you pick.

That is what overads does, with one step Bluesky does not describe anywhere: a held post waits for a teammate's approval before the scheduler writes it.

How to schedule Bluesky posts in overads

1. In Bluesky, open Settings, Privacy and security, App passwords, and make one for overads.
2. In overads, connect Bluesky from the app, enter your handle and paste the app password.
3. Write the post in Publish, attach images or one video within the limits above if you want them, and check the Bluesky preview.
4. Pick the date and time, and switch on approval if a teammate should read it first.
5. Once it is approved, overads publishes it at that time and the post's delivery log shows the result.

Developers can do the same over the REST API or the MCP server: create the post with scheduledAt and the Bluesky connection id, and a member approves it in the app. Links, mentions and hashtags become Bluesky rich text on their own. If you post the same work to X, the X scheduler page covers X's own limits.

When another Bluesky scheduler fits better

Choose the Bluesky app or another tool when:

• You want to schedule threads, replies or quote posts on Bluesky. overads sends top-level posts only.
• Your security policy rules out app passwords and you need to sign in with Bluesky's OAuth. That sign-in is built in overads but not switched on in the deployed product yet.
• You post alone, in the moment, and never plan ahead. The Bluesky app is enough.
• You also need to post to Threads, YouTube and TikTok. Those channels are built in overads but still in each platform's review, and do not publish for customers yet.

overads fits a small team that plans Bluesky posts ahead, wants a teammate to approve them, and posts the same work to its other channels. Plans are on pricing; neither plan caps publishing channels.