# Changing the period override setting or refresh interval for the CloudWatch dashboard
Changing the period override setting or refresh interval

You can specify how the period setting of graphs added to this dashboard are retained or modified.

When an auto period or persisted time range is applied to a widget, the overall time range of the graph can affect the periods that you have set.
+ If the time range is one day or less, period settings are not changed.
+ If the time range is between one day and three days, periods set to below five minutes are changed to 5 minutes.
+ If the time range is more than three days, periods set to below one hour are changed to one hour.

The following steps explain how to use the console to change the period override options. You can also change them by using the `periodOverride` field in the JSON structure of the dashboard. For more information, see [ Dashboard Body Overall Structure](https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonCloudWatch/latest/APIReference/CloudWatch-Dashboard-Body-Structure.html#Dashboard-Body-Overall-Structure).

**To change the period override options**

1. Open the CloudWatch console at [https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudwatch/](https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudwatch/).

1. Choose **Actions**.

1. Under **Period override**, choose one of the following:
   + Choose **Auto** to have the period of the metrics on each graph automatically adapt to the dashboard's time range.
   + Choose **Do not override** to ensure that the period setting of each graph is always obeyed.
   + Choose one of the other options to cause graphs added to the dashboard to always adapt that chosen time as their period setting.

   The **Period override** always reverts to **Auto** when the dashboard is closed or the browser is refreshed. Different settings for **Period override** can't be saved.

You can change how often the data on your CloudWatch dashboard is refreshed.

**To change the dashboard refresh interval**

1. Open the CloudWatch console at [https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudwatch/](https://console.aws.amazon.com/cloudwatch/).

1. In the navigation pane, choose **Dashboards**, and then choose a dashboard.

1. On the **Refresh options** menu (upper-right corner), choose **10 Seconds**, **1 Minute**, **2 Minutes**, **5 Minutes**, or **15 Minutes**.