# Bee brood timeline calculator > Saw eggs or capped brood? See when the cells are capped and when a worker, queen or drone emerges, from the development times in UGA Extension Bulletin 1045. Canonical: https://lucernel.com/tools/bee-brood-timeline-calculator Last updated: 2026-10-02 Choose worker, queen or drone, and whether you saw eggs or capped cells. You get the days when the cells are capped and when the bees emerge. Free, no account. Everything runs in your browser. Nothing you type is sent or stored. Interactive version: https://lucernel.com/tools/bee-brood-timeline-calculator ## How it works Every honey bee goes through the same stages: egg, larva, pupa and adult. The castes take different times. Counted from the day the egg is laid, University of Georgia Extension (Bulletin 1045, Table 1) gives: eggs hatch on day 3 for all three; cells are capped on day 8 for workers and queens and day 10 for drones; bees emerge on day 21 (worker), 16 (queen) and 24 (drone). You rarely know the day an egg was laid. An egg is 0 to 3 days old, so from eggs the tool gives a window of about three days for each stage. A capped cell can hold a bee anywhere from the day it was capped to the day before it emerges. From capped cells the tool counts from tomorrow to the latest possible day: 13 days for workers, 8 for queens and 14 for drones. Formula: Eggs seen on day D: emerges between D + (E − 3) and D + E. Capped cells seen on day D: emerges between D + 1 and D + (E − C). E and C are the emerge and capping days: worker 21 and 8, queen 16 and 8, drone 24 and 10. ## Good to know - These are typical times. Cold weather, a weak colony or poor food can make development a little slower. - The tool reads dates, not frames: check the brood yourself before you decide to combine, split or requeen. ## Add this to your site Free, no account. Paste an iframe of https://lucernel.com/embed/bee-brood-timeline-calculator into a page, with the credit link under it: [Bee brood timeline calculator by Waxley](https://lucernel.com/tools/bee-brood-timeline-calculator). Add ?theme=dark to the frame address for the dark version. The snippet is on the tool page. ## Frequently asked questions ### How long does a worker bee take to emerge? 21 days from the egg. The egg hatches on day 3, the cell is capped on day 8 and the bee chews its way out on day 21 (UGA Extension Bulletin 1045). ### When will a capped queen cell hatch? A queen emerges on day 16 and her cell is capped on day 8, so a capped queen cell holds a queen that emerges within the next 8 days. ### How long do drones take to develop? 24 days from the egg. Drone cells are capped on day 10, two days later than worker cells. ### How old are the eggs I see? Between 0 and 3 days old: eggs hatch into larvae on day 3. Seeing eggs means the colony had a laying queen in the last three days. ## Waxley remembers what you saw. Log the inspection in a minute, with eggs, larvae, capped brood and queen cells, and set the re-check before you close the lid. The reminder comes at the time you choose. - Inspections with "Not seen" kept apart from "Not checked" - Re-checks with reminders - The story of every colony, hive to hive [Waxley](https://lucernel.com/apps/waxley) ## Sources (checked 2026-10-02) - [University of Georgia Extension: Honey Bees and Beekeeping (Bulletin 1045), Table 1](https://fieldreport.caes.uga.edu/publications/B1045/honey-bees-and-beekeeping/)