> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://help.the-meridian.ai/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Wait

**Wait** pauses a flow for a while, then continues from the next step. Use it for drip sequences: email after an abandoned charge, wait 15 minutes, email again the next day, and so on.

It does not send anything by itself. A flow that only waits cannot activate. Pair it with [Send email](/send-email) or [Populate custom field](/populate-custom-field).

## Modes

**A duration from now**: minutes, hours, or days. This is the common case for follow-ups (15 minutes, then 1 day).

**A specific date and time**: resume at an absolute instant (UTC).

**A time of day**: resume at the next clock time you choose. Optionally restrict to weekdays (Sunday through Saturday). Timezone is an IANA name; the default is UTC.

**Until an event fires**: pause until another automation trigger fires for the same store. You also set a timeout (1 minute to 30 days). If the timeout elapses first, choose whether to **continue** the flow or **cancel** the rest of it.

The match is on the trigger itself, for the same store. Any occurrence of that trigger resumes the run, whatever its settings elsewhere: waiting on **Custom field changes** resumes on any field, not only one you name in another automation.

Pauses must be at least **1 minute** and at most **30 days** from the moment the Wait is reached (for until-event, that window is the timeout).

## Business hours

Optionally snap the resume time into a business window (start, end, weekdays, timezone). If the computed resume falls outside the window, Meridian moves it to the next open slot. Timezone is still an IANA name you pick; Meridian does not yet auto-detect each store's Shopify timezone.

## Exit while waiting

On any Wait, you can name an **exit event**. If that trigger fires for the same store while the run is waiting, Meridian marks the run **Cancelled** and does not run later steps. Typical use: stop an abandoned-charge drip once the merchant subscribes. As with until-event, the exit matches the trigger itself, not a particular field, event name or threshold.

## How a run behaves

When a run hits a Wait, Meridian:

1. Finishes every non-Wait action reachable in that segment (including siblings that do not go through the Wait).
2. Marks the run **Waiting** with a resume time (or a timeout deadline for until-event).
3. Continues later from the steps after that Wait, unless exit-on-event or until-event timeout+exit cancelled it.

Conditions **after** a Wait are evaluated again on resume, with live store data. Conditions **before** the Wait already decided the path that reached it.

If you deactivate or delete the automation while a run is waiting, resume marks the run **Skipped** and sends nothing further. Graph edits while a run is waiting do not rewire that run: it continues on the graph snapshot frozen at the first pause.

Two Wait steps that could run at the same time are refused when you save an active flow or activate it. Put Waits one after another, or on different branches of a condition (only one branch runs, so a Wait on Yes and a Wait on No never overlap). A Wait must also lead to a step: one with nothing after it is refused for the same reason.

## Testing

A [test run](/automation-test-runs) shows each Wait as a step with the resume time it would use. Nothing is scheduled.


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