Free agenda tool
Run of Show Cue Sheet Template
This is a free run of show cue sheet template you can edit in the browser, pre-filled with a realistic 68-minute live show from standby through to walk-out music. A cue sheet is finer-grained than a run of show: each row is one callable action, not one agenda item. Set the show start time once and every cue below takes its own clock time from the durations above it, so trimming a video by ninety seconds re-times the rest of the show instead of quietly invalidating it.
13 items, 68 minutes, pre-filled and fully editable. Free, no sign-up.
Total length
1 hr 8 min
Finishes at
8:08 PM
- 7:00 PM
- 7:05 PM
- 7:07 PM
- 7:09 PM
- 7:12 PM
- 7:17 PM
- 7:18 PM
- 7:33 PM
- 7:41 PM
- 7:44 PM
- 7:48 PM
- 7:58 PM
- 8:03 PM
Run of Show Cue Sheet Template
| Time | Agenda item | Owner | Minutes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 7:00 PM | Standby — house to half, comms check | Technical director | 5 |
| 7:05 PM | Walk-in music out, house to black | Audio | 2 |
| 7:07 PM | Opening title video (VT1) roll | Video | 2 |
| 7:09 PM | Host entrance — spotlight up, mic 1 live | Lighting | 3 |
| 7:12 PM | Host welcome and housekeeping | Host | 5 |
| 7:17 PM | Lower third and slides to screen | Graphics | 1 |
| 7:18 PM | Speaker 1 on stage | Speaker 1 | 15 |
| 7:33 PM | Audience Q&A — questions to screen | Host | 8 |
| 7:41 PM | Transition sting, stage reset | Stage manager | 3 |
| 7:44 PM | Award package video (VT2) roll | Video | 4 |
| 7:48 PM | Presenter and winner on stage | Presenter | 10 |
| 7:58 PM | Closing remarks, credits roll, house up | Host | 5 |
| 8:03 PM | Walk-out music, doors open | Audio | 5 |
| 8:08 PM | Finish | 68 |
Your agenda says 15 minutes. Your speaker takes 23.
Planned time on paper and what actually happens live are two different numbers, and every minute of the difference comes out of whatever was scheduled next. asktimer.com is the part that runs after the agenda is written.
A real countdown for every speaker
The minutes on this page are a plan. In the room, the plan needs enforcing. Load the same running order into asktimer.com and every speaker gets their own confidence monitor — a large countdown for their slot that turns green to amber to red as their time goes, readable at a glance from the podium. No card waved from the back of the room, and no speaker quietly wondering how long they have left.
Audience Q&A tied to the same session
The audience opens one link on their phones, submits questions and upvotes the ones they want answered, so the question the room actually cares about rises to the top instead of the loudest voice getting there first. The speaker can show that list on their own monitor when they're ready for it, and whoever is hosting marks each question covered as they work down it — so nothing gets asked twice and nothing gets lost.
One link each. Nothing to install.
A private link for the host running the show, one monitor link per speaker, and one public link for the audience. Everyone opens a browser tab — no app to install, no accounts for your speakers or your attendees, and no software to get working on a venue laptop ten minutes before doors.
How to use this Run of show cue sheet template
- 1
Set your start time
Type the time the meeting actually begins. Every row below recalculates its own clock time from that one field, so you never re-type a single time again.
- 2
Edit the items and durations
The template is already filled in with a realistic running order. Rename anything, add the person presenting it, and set how many minutes each item gets.
- 3
Add, remove and reorder
Move an item up or down and the whole schedule re-times itself instantly. Nothing breaks the way it does when you drag a row in a spreadsheet full of hard-coded times.
- 4
Check the finish time
The running total and the computed finish time sit at the top. If the finish time is later than you promised people, trim minutes until it isn't.
- 5
Copy or print it
Copy the whole agenda as plain text to paste into an email or calendar invite, or print a clean one-page version for the room.
How to build a run of show cue sheet that holds up live
A cue sheet answers a narrower question than a run of show: what is the next thing somebody has to physically do, and who does it. "Opening keynote, 30 minutes" belongs on a run of show. "House to black — lighting", "VT1 roll — video", "Mic 1 live — audio" belong on a cue sheet, because each one is a single instruction a single person executes on a call. If a row needs two departments to act, it is two rows.
Number the cues, and never renumber them. Cues get cut and added right up to doors, and the standard trick is to insert 12A between 12 and 13 rather than shifting everything down — because the moment the numbers move, the marked-up scripts, the comms shorthand and the notes people scribbled in rehearsal all stop matching. Version and date the sheet too: the most common live failure is one department working from an older print.
Write the standby, not just the go. Every cue in practice is two moments — the warning that puts a department on their toes, and the call that fires it. A sheet that only records the go is a sheet that gets called late. Give the standbys their own rows wherever the timing is tight, and the gap between the two becomes a visible duration rather than something living in the caller's head.
Give the stage the same clock as the crew
A cue sheet keeps the crew in sync, and asktimer.com extends that to the person at the microphone. Load the same running order and every speaker gets a full-screen countdown for their own slot, color-staged from green to red, plus a private line from you to their screen whenever a cue moves. Free to start, and your crew and speakers just open a link.
Run of Show Cue Sheet Template: what usually goes wrong
- Keep one column per department only if you genuinely have separate operators. A two-person crew is better served by one ordered list than a grid they have to scan sideways under pressure.
- Put the runtime of every video and music bed on the sheet. A cue sheet where the timings are guesses drifts inside the first quarter of the show.
- Say what happens after the cue, not just the cue. "VT1 roll (2:14, ends on black, host walks on)" tells the caller what to watch for; "VT1" does not.
- Print it, and print a spare. Comms and laptops fail; paper does not. A wall clock and a printed cue sheet have run more shows than any software.
- Rehearse cue to cue, skipping the content in between. You are testing the transitions, and transitions are where live shows break.
Frequently asked questions
What is a run of show cue sheet?
A cue sheet is the ordered list of technical calls that make a show happen — lights, sound, video, graphics, stage moves — each with a number, a duration and the department that executes it. It sits underneath the run of show: the run of show says what the segment is, the cue sheet says exactly what gets fired and when.
What is the difference between a cue sheet and a run of show?
Granularity and audience. A run of show covers the whole working day in agenda-sized blocks for the whole team; a cue sheet covers the show itself in single actions for the crew calling it. A thirty-minute keynote is one row on a run of show and can easily be a dozen rows on a cue sheet.
Do I need cue numbers?
For anything with more than a handful of technical moments, yes. Numbers are how a caller refers to a cue over comms without describing it, and how you insert a late change — 12A between 12 and 13 — without invalidating every marked-up copy in the building.
Is this cue sheet template free?
Yes. No sign-up, no download, nothing to install. Edit it in the browser and copy or print the result.
Can I use this for theatre, church or broadcast?
Yes. The vocabulary differs — you may call it a prompt book, an order of service or a rundown — but the structure is the same: numbered actions, durations, owners, and a running clock derived from them.
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Turn this agenda into a live run-of-show
Load the same running order into asktimer.com and every speaker gets a live countdown, your audience gets Q&A they can upvote from their phones, and you get one link each for host, speaker and audience. Free to start, nothing to install.
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