We investigate the initial moments of capillary rise of liquids in a tube. in this period both inertia and viscous flow losses balance the pressure generated by the meniscus curvature (capillary pressure). It is known that the very first stage is purely dominated by inertial forces, where subsequently the influence of viscosity increases (visco-inertial flow). Finally the effect of inertia vanishes and the flow becomes purely viscous. In this study we derive the times and meniscus heights at which the transition between the time periods occur. This is done in an attempt to provide a method to determine a priori which terms of the momentum balance are relevant for a given problem. Analytic solutions known from previous literature are discussed and the time intervals of their validity compared. The predicted transition times and the calculated heights show good agreement with experimental results from literature. The results are also discussed in dimensionless form and the limitations of the calculations are pointed out. (C) 2008 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.