Text & Developer
Cron Expression Explainer
The cron expression explainer turns a five-field cron schedule into plain English and lists the next times it will run. Type or paste an expression such as 0 9 * * 1-5, or pick an example, and see exactly when your job fires. Everything runs in your browser.
The five cron fields
| Field | Allowed values |
|---|---|
| Minute | 0 to 59 |
| Hour | 0 to 23 |
| Day of month | 1 to 31 |
| Month | 1 to 12 or JAN to DEC |
| Day of week | 0 to 7 or SUN to SAT (0 and 7 are Sunday) |
Special characters
*means every value.,separates a list, such as 1,15.-gives a range, such as 9-17./gives a step, such as */10 for every 10.
When both day-of-month and day-of-week are restricted, standard cron runs the job when either one matches, not both. Check which time zone your scheduler uses, since many servers run in UTC.
Questions people ask
What does */5 mean?
It means every fifth value starting from the first, so */5 in the minute field runs at minutes 0, 5, 10 and so on.
Does cron support seconds?
Classic cron does not. Some schedulers such as Quartz add a sixth field for seconds, which this tool does not read.
Why did my job run at a different hour?
Usually a time zone difference between your server and your own clock. Switch the display between UTC and local to compare.