When the ads manager is active, the timer shown in chat AND the timestamp supplied to bots via the API are incorrect. The timer will count down to zero and the ads will not start on average for another 60 seconds. However, I have personally measured them being as much as 4 minutes late. The closest to on time I've ever seen is around 25 seconds late.

While it is unreasonable to expect ads to start with millisecond level accuracy they should start only several seconds late at most. This inaccuracy applies to bots who are using the API to query the ad schedule, the timer displayed in chat, and the ads widget on the dashboard.

It is VERY difficult for a streamer to smoothly transition into an ad break when they have no idea when the ads will start. The uncertainty of when an ad will begin degrades the viewer's experience AND increases animosity for Ads. Ensuring streamers can smoothly transition in and out of an ad break by assuring viewers they won't miss things, putting messages in chat ahead of ads, displaying special content during ads, and welcoming viewers back from the ads can provide a much smoother viewing experience. But, it is functionally impossible due to the ad timer's inaccuracy.

Please make the timers and API timestamps more accurate.

Additional Technical Details: I verified this is not clock-drift between my PC and the twitch servers (At least ingest). Both by syncing the system clock to AWS's time server AND by checking the timestamps of when OBS starts the stream and when the Twitch Inspector received the stream.