How to Add Sleep/Wait in Windows Batch Script

You can use timeout command to wait for command prompt or batch script for the specified amount of time. The time is defined in Seconds.

For example to wait for 5 seconds use. Use /T options:

c:/> timeout /T 5

You can also specify seconds directly like:

c:/> timeout 5

The above commands will break the timeout process on pressing any key. You can use /NOBREAK ignore key presses and wait for the specified time.

c:/> timeout /T 5 /NOBREAK

Windows XP users use sleep command instead of the timeout.

c:/> sleep 5