How long does each mission take? In Bomb Appétit the starting clock runs from four minutes on the shortest missions to fifteen on Double shift, the biggest bomb. A real attempt lasts longer than its clock, because choosing the mission, opening the manual, reading the result and talking it over all happen off the timer.
Mission time limits from four to fifteen minutes
Each of the 20 missions sets its own countdown. Section 1 clocks are four or five minutes, Section 2 runs five to seven, Section 3 runs six to nine, and Section 4 spans six to fifteen. The missions page prints every clock on its mission card, next to the module count and strike limit.
The table lists every clock from the game's mission data, in the order the missions appear. A panel here means one slot on the case that holds a module, so the third column adds the regular modules to the needy ones. The last column divides the clock in seconds by that panel count. It is a figure we worked out to compare missions; the game itself never shows it.
| Mission | Section | Modules + needy | Clock | Seconds per panel |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| First bite | 1 | 1 + 0 | 5 min | 300 |
| Button up | 1 | 2 + 0 | 5 min | 150 |
| Strange symbols | 1 | 3 + 0 | 5 min | 100 |
| Table for three | 1 | 3 + 0 | 4 min | 80 |
| Quick snack | 1 | 4 + 0 | 4 min | 60 |
| Echo chamber | 2 | 3 + 0 | 5 min | 100 |
| Word salad | 2 | 3 + 0 | 5 min | 100 |
| Second helpings | 2 | 3 + 0 | 5 min | 100 |
| Mixed plate | 2 | 5 + 0 | 7 min | 84 |
| Rush hour | 2 | 6 + 0 | 6 min | 60 |
| Signal fire | 3 | 3 + 0 | 6 min | 120 |
| Spaghetti | 3 | 3 + 0 | 6 min | 120 |
| Pressure cooker | 3 | 4 + 1 | 6 min | 72 |
| Full boil | 3 | 6 + 1 | 7 min | 60 |
| Back of house | 3 | 8 + 2 | 9 min | 54 |
| Lost in the sauce | 4 | 4 + 0 | 6 min | 90 |
| The works | 4 | 11 + 0 | 11 min | 60 |
| No substitutions | 4 | 10 + 1 | 10 min | 54.5 |
| Double shift | 4 | 14 + 3 | 15 min | 52.9 |
| Bomb Appétit | 4 | 11 + 0 | 10 min | 54.5 |
Added together, the five clocks in each section come to 23 minutes for Section 1, 28 for Section 2, 34 for Section 3 and 52 for Section 4. All twenty clocks sum to 137 minutes, a little over two and a quarter hours of countdown.
A clock is a ceiling, not a duration. A team that defuses Quick snack with a minute and a half left has spent two and a half minutes on it. Mistakes shorten the real time in the other direction, since each strike makes the countdown run faster; our guide to how strikes speed up the clock shows the rates.
Why do later missions give less time per module?
Later missions do not cut the time on every bomb, but the tightest bomb in each section gets tighter. Measured in seconds per panel, the low point is 60 in Sections 1 and 2, 54 in Section 3 and about 53 on Double shift. The clock grows with the bomb, just not as fast as the bomb does.
Inside a section the pattern runs the other way at first. Signal fire and Spaghetti, the first two missions of Section 3, allow 120 seconds per module, more than anything in Section 2. Each one brings in module types the team has not met, such as the Blinker or Tangled Wires, and the generous clock leaves room to learn a new manual page. The squeeze comes on the closing missions of a section, once every type in it is familiar.
Needy modules count as panels in the table even though they cannot be solved. They still take attention, because each one wakes up and has to be dealt with before its own countdown ends. That is why Back of house, with eight modules and two needy ones on nine minutes, sits lower than its regular module count alone would suggest. The five missions that carry needy modules are covered one by one in our post on the missions with needy modules.
Section 4 adds the bigger case on Double shift and the shortest per-panel figure in the game. What else that section changes, from The works to the final bomb, is laid out in the Section 4 missions and the bigger case.
How long does a mission attempt take with setup and a reset?
A mission attempt takes its clock plus several minutes on either side. Before the countdown, someone picks the mission, the Experts open the manual on the right rule seed and the Defuser reads out the edgework. After it comes the result and the talk about what went wrong. The game does not time any of that.
Here is the shape of one attempt in an online room, step by step:
- The host chooses the mission from the room's list, where each one carries its section and number, such as "1.5 Quick snack".
- Players pick roles, and the host presses Arm the bomb once someone has taken the Defuser seat.
- The countdown runs until the bomb is defused, explodes or hits zero.
- The room returns to its lobby with a "Last game" line and a details link to the full result page.
The result page lists each module with the moment it was solved and any strikes it caused. Reading it together is often the most useful two minutes of the attempt.
An invented example for one attempt at Quick snack: one minute in the lobby while the Experts open manual 1, a little under four minutes of countdown, then two minutes on the result page. That is about seven minutes from one lobby to the next. Your group will be faster or slower; time one attempt and use your own number.
The mission time mistake: planning an evening from clock totals
Adding up the clocks tells you the least time an evening can take, not the time it will take. Section 4's clocks sum to 52 minutes, yet a group that loses Double shift twice spends up to 30 more minutes of countdown on that mission alone, before any break between rounds.
Three things stretch a plan built from clock totals. Retries are the biggest: a lost bomb usually gets a second try, and a second try costs a full clock again. Setup is the next, at a few minutes per attempt even for a practised group. Debriefs come last, and they tend to grow as the bombs get bigger, since there are more modules to talk through.
A safer way to plan is to take the section's clock total and roughly double it, then decide in advance which mission ends the night if time runs short. For the closing missions, also check the strike limit, because No substitutions allows two strikes and the final mission allows one. Our post on how many strikes each mission gives you explains what that changes.