I'm the weirdo and made a buffer of 50 pages which took me over a year to do thanks to school lmao....
but a buffer is always good to have! especially for days where you don't feel like working/taking a break from drawing comic pages - even an added bonus if you decide to have a patreon, you can have it as a reward that people who donate can read one page ahead or smth along those lines.
Hell yes! Never start a new chapter or set of strips without it. Moreso if you are doing a long form comic though.
LOL nada.
I update an average of 40-50 panels an update that usually takes me 2 weeks to finish. Even if I want to make a buffer, I just can't seem to break ahead. I have been going at this, finishing my update last minute, for over a year so I guess it's not too bad. But it's definitely great having a buffer. You would feel less stressed about not being able to finish your update on time!
I have a gag comic and I still recommend having 20 pages of buffer minimum. It doesn't seem necessary until you really need it.
Yes and no.
Patrons are ahead on 3 of my series, so on those i have the patreon buffer. Meaning if I know I will update on one specific day, I can upload a page on tapas at a more "profitable" time even if I haven't finished drawing the page for patreon yet. Usually patrons get pages either a few hours before or a few hours after the tapas update, but it's always on the same day.
Fourth one has a big buffer, but isn't on patreon.
Fifth one is a short comic that will hopefully run less than 100 pages, which I'm planning to finish within the upcoming 1-3 months to free up space to work on something else. This one has no buffer.
I update as a daily strip and currently have a buffer of three months~90 strips (original it was six but it slipped heavily due to a rough start and lotsa stress. I'm such a noob 
)
Right now I caught myself and keep my buffer quite well. If I ever catch up, I'll probably go on an hiatus for a week or two and post reruns in that time...I hope that won't happen for a while tho...
I upload 1 or 2 pages a week and I've never had a buffer… but I do find them very useful and wish I had one, haha.
I previously had a buffer on a different comic, but it was too far ahead (over 100 pages ahead, actually) and it really detached me from the story and made it hard for me to remember to post on time since I wasn't constantly working towards a posting deadline. So that actually worked against me, haha! 
I have almost a year of comic buffer. May seem crazy but I have a full time job and I need some breathing room. It also gives me time to relax so I don't get burn out.
Oh, those good old days when I had time to have a buffer. I used to have one when the Support Program was still active. I had two pages for the early release and then two page buffer. So fo regular readers, it's like a 4 page buffer.
Now, because of college, work and preparing for finding a full time job, I have 0. I do recommend a consistent schedule (in other words, not what I've been doing lately). The only time I would have hiatus after finishing a chapter is to work on writing up the next chapter and drawing the thumbnails, which can take hours.
How long does it take you to complete a single page? My work takes less than 20 minutes on paper and 4-6 hours to ink it digitally and add panels, speech, tones, etc. 8 hours tops. Depending on how busy you are, once a week is pretty good. Twice a week is better but quite a bit of work.
No buffer here. If I get ahead with drawing, I usually end up being lazy and take it easy until it's gone again xD
Of my 3 series, I have a 2-3 page buffer for one of them, and I only built that buffer a couple months ago when the comic is over 2 years old.
This! Plus, I also get really anxious if I don't show the finished material to people right away. Like, does this even make sense to anyone other than me???? It's like someone with arachnophobia needing to know if there's a spider in their bed. It's not about wanting praises right away; it's about wanting to make sure there are no metaphorical spiders lurking in my buffer!
I have a small buffer, about 1-5 weeks ahead (varies), but only because I share the buffer with my Patrons. I don't think I could maintain ANY buffer without that.
I have like half a year buffer for both my ongoing comics D:
It's not fun feeling detached to it (because I do) but I also enjoy being able to take a week or two off and not work on comics at all.
I mean, life happens so it's nice to not feel guilty (I do, even so) if you prefer a week on the couch.
yeah, I had a thirty page buffer before starting and generally have a half-year buffer like a few people here. It's nice to not have to panic if you don't finish a page in time. It also lets you work in chunks, which for me at least, helps create flow in the pages.
I have about 2-3 pages drawn out ahead of time.
My comic style is pretty simplistic but it's still better to have stuff ready than to not.
I try to have at least a few pages, but have a bad habit of running out. Usually when starting a new story.
I didn't for my previous comics, or my first two chapters of my current on.
I'm currently building one for Chapter 3 onwards because I'm done with being stressed all the time.
This is not all in your head; I'm often told about mistakes I've made 2 months after I make them because of my patreon early access buffer. Patrons are less likely to notice and point them out than the larger Tapas and Webtoons audiences so it doesn't get mentioned until it hits Tapas and Webtoons.
HAHAHA! No, I don't have a buffer, I had a 1 page buffer, used it within 2 weeks 
That said, I would like to have a 1 page buffer. My plan is to level up my drawing speed. Which I think is working. What's been keeping me on task through a full time job and weeks of an ear infection/bronchitis for myself and viral infections for my two year old daughter has been a combination of the "pomodoro" technique and the "don't break the chain" technique.
I started out with "Don't break the chain" only, but it wasn't enough, the "pomodoro" technique seriously leveled up my time management and focus. Right now "Don't break the chain" reinforces my motivation... love that string of red Xs on my calendar Do yourselves a favor and research these two things.
BSandL updates are rather long so usually I don't have any buffer... :'D It's a bit stressful, but I've kept up with a weekly update schedule for a year and I've learned to schedule my life so that I have enough time for making the comic. And on those weeks that I can't update the story, I upload a full-colour illustration, Q&A, or something.
Yeah, everyone makes mistakes and some of those mistakes can be critical! Fortunately, I have a couple of Patrons who speak up when they spot things, but even they can't see everything...
Buffers are good until something dramatic comes up in your life. I used to have a buffer of 15 episodes - but then some family stuff happened and it went to nothing...
I'm on team buffer. I worked my ass off during six months to build it, ended up with 36 pages ( which is really 31 pages in terms of updates, since the five first pages were posted in the same update ). I agree with the fact that at time it's really complicated to be so disconnected with what you are drawing and what people are reading, but having such a big buffer actually allowed me to take two month to plan the next part of the comic and actually take a rest ( which turns out is needed after churning so many pages in so little time when you're the person who does everything from start to finish ). Now I know I'll just go back to drawing pages at the start of september without having to worry about wether or not I will be on time because there will always be at least on page to fall back on.
So yeah, you kind of feel left out of the fun because you're so ahead of time and you cannot share the cool things you're doing right now, but I feel it's worth it, because I personally despise stress. The worst thing will probably to look back on the quality of the first pages of your buffer and realize there's so many mistakes you can't fix now, but heh, it would end up happening without buffer anyway, the first few pages of every comic are meh in retrospective.
I would say maybe have a little buffer at least. So you're not too ahead of your readers but you also have a fall back in case something goes awry. As a reader it really bums me when I go to check the comic the day it updates only to be greeted by nothing and/or a message to say sorry. I'm ok with announced hiatus, I'm ok with a few weeks of little doodles/bonus illustrations instead of comic pages, but just going to see the update and getting nothing ? If it happens too often, no matter how cool the comic, the chances I go back every week to read gets slimmer and slimmer.
so yeah, keep that in mind when choosing wether or not you want to go buffer-free
I always try to make at least 1 chapter as a buffer. My only problem, is...well, I don't write so fast. I always try to set a deadline of at least 2 weeks though, so I have something to gove to Tapas.
I personally like having a big buffer (20-40 pages) so I can make sweeping edits across all the pages before they go public. If I had to post them immediately at finish and then realized a design didn't work 6 pages into the scene, the thought of having to explain the change to the fans and halting regular updates so I can go back to change those pages would stress me out SO much and be super embarrassing. I'd rather have everything finalized and done when I post, which usually doesn't happen until the 40 page chapter is complete and swept through for last minute changes.
I know I can produce 6-10 pages a month depending on life circumstances (I average 8) so I have it scheduled out that a chapter is released over ~5 months, and then I take a month break of updating on Tapas once the chapter is over to give me some wiggle room for writing, concepting, and thumbnailing. That means I need to do everything start to finish for a chapter within 6 months to not fall behind. To be honest though it took me awhile to even get that fast, I'm still working on it ;;;
Just do what ends up working for you and your process. The nice thing here is that you can see into a ton of more experienced peoples' workflow and try out different things until they stick. There's not one solution for everyone!
I'm glad to hear I'm not the only one here with a large buffer!!! 
But yah... as others have mentioned, the excitement rolled down the hill faster and faster
the more time has passed by 
I wish I had a buffer!! I was 1-2 pages in advance when I wasn't working full-time, it was cool, but nowadays I often finish the page on the day of uploading. Not recommending this 
I tried to have a buffer but then it... didn't.... happen....
I think because of art school I learned how to do things last minute so it I learned a bad habit.
But I think whether you have a buffer or not depends on your confidence in your consistent drawing speed and the event-ness of your life
What I'm doing is Doing all of the first chapter which is 7 or 8 pages long at least and probably sketch out some of the second chapter then I will start posting it one every week. Then for the 8-9 weeks I have I'll start working on the second chapter if I haven't already. After all of Chapter 1 has been posted I will most likely take a few weeks off posting a few quick non canon comics about the characters/concept art to keep readers interested (Depends on when i start posting as this time might run into exams so I will probably take longer off and post less random stuff) and probably work like crazy in those few weeks getting chapter 2 done and keep doing that.
I draw with my laptop and only half the time use a mouse and do everything myself so even though the colours are basic is takes me a while to draw (I also get distracted easily.... i should be drawing now) and I have another comic I was going to start this time in full colour and a different style as well as a game I'm making and I also get a lot of homework.
...
You can create a buffer on this website?
I kid.
I have terrible work ethic and do everything on the spot.
I am working on a buffer right now before I start posting pages next month. I hope to have a 30 page buffer.
And planning on posting 2x a week for my patrons, 1x everywhere else.
I had a buffer when I started my current story arc. It was around 15 pages, but then it quickly dried up. Now I do a new page every day. ^_^;;
I eat my buffers for breakfast. Aka, I tend to get a buffer, then slack off/get sick, then BOOM. No more buffer. 
I need to stop this. Haha. Someone tell me their ways!
Wow, reading the majority of the replies here makes me feel like I'm being super-cautious. For one of my two series, which updates with 2 pages a week, I have a buffer of more than a 100 pages, and the other series is finished and I'm just posting it on Tapas a page at a time.
I'm completely with @BitteRjelly on this one. If my buffer was smaller, or absent, I'm sure that I would panic, because then drawing the comic would start to feel less like a hobby and more like an obligation to uphold. I'm really no good with coping with stress like that, so a huge buffer that allows me to work at a leisurely pace and plan everything is my best friend. This way, I only need to keep up with the updating schedule and create two pages a week, which is well within my ability, but also gives me time to cool down and relax. I have a full time job as well, and while there are periods when I don't have much work, it still takes its toll.
I would say that, yes, you need a buffer, but also there will be times when it's gone. That's what it's for, to accommodate the ups and downs of life. I'm in a really busy time of year, and my buffer is gone. I really have to focus to hit my updates (I've never missed one, but did do a two week hiatus, announced well in advance), but that's fine. I believe very strongly that you should update at production pace, even if you have a buffer, because the buffer is not there to make you seem faster than you are (comic book publishers use buffers and overlapping creative teams for this reason, but that's a whole different animal). So even though I have no buffer, my update pace is about what my life can accommodate (4-6 pages, every three weeks). Come winter, when things are less busy, I hope to rebuild some buffer, as I generally have more time to do so. But averaged over the whole year, I'm using a buffer even though there are times when it's used up. Kinda like overdraft protection for a checking account, if that makes sense...
