NTP pool

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The NTP pool is a dynamic collection of networked computers that volunteer to provide highly accurate time via the Network Time Protocol to clients worldwide. The machines that are "in the pool" are part of the pool.ntp.org domain as well as of several subdomains divided by geographical zone and are distributed to NTP clients via round robin DNS. Work is being done to make the geographic zone selection unnecessary, via customized authoritative DNS servers that utilize geolocation software.

As of April 2008, the pool consists of about 1600 time servers, up from about 1000 one year earlier.^[1] Because of the decentralization of this project accurate statistics on the number of clients cannot be obtained, but according to the project's website the pool provides time to “two to six millions of systems around the world”.

There is always a desire for more time servers, as the more time servers are in the pool, the lower the resource demand on each member. Joining the pool requires at least a broadband connection to the Internet, a static IP address, and accurate time from another source (for example from another NTP server, from a DCF77 receiver or a GPS receiver).

This project was started by Adrian von Bidder in January 2003 and has been maintained by Ask Bjørn Hansen since July 2005.