In this article, I analyse the tensions between the need for swift action and enactment of emergency legislation during Finland’s COVID-19 pandemic response. I focus on how this demand for the executive branch to take swift and decisive action met and clashed with the temporal (in)efficiency of emergency legislation. A legalist emergency measures theory is developed to approach this issue in the context of the Finnish emergency regime, which is legalist in principle. Legalist emergency regimes are those that (1) require emergency measures to be grounded in law, (2) seek to legislate emergency powers in advance, and (3) necessitate that legislation is active during emergencies. Based on reports regarding the executive branch’s actions during the pandemic, I discuss issues regarding the alleged slowness of legislation during emergencies. The article seeks to further develop the theoretical discussion on the temporal aspects of emergency measures.