The orthant model is a directed percolation model on $\mathbb {Z}^{d}$
ℤ
d
, in which all clusters are infinite. We prove a sharp threshold result for this model: if p is larger than the critical value above which the cluster of 0 is contained in a cone, then the shift from 0 that is required to contain the cluster of 0 in that cone is exponentially small. As a consequence, above this critical threshold, a shape theorem holds for the cluster of 0, as well as ballisticity of the random walk on this cluster.