Cron Expression Explainer

Paste any cron schedule and understand it in plain English.

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The short answer

‘0 9 * * MON’ means ‘at 09:00 every Monday’ — the five fields are minute, hour, day-of-month, month, day-of-week. */15 means ‘every 15’, and 0 0 1 * * is midnight on the first of each month. This tool also lists the next few actual run times so there’s no guessing.

How to use the cron expression explainer

  1. Paste your cron expression.
  2. Read the plain-English explanation.
  3. Check the next scheduled runs.

Cron Expression Explainer — FAQs

What do the 5 cron fields mean?

Minute (0–59), hour (0–23), day of month (1–31), month (1–12), day of week (0–7, both 0 and 7 = Sunday).

What does */15 mean?

‘Every 15’ — */15 in the minute field runs at :00, :15, :30, :45. In the hour field it’d be every 15 hours.

How do I run something every weekday at 9am?

0 9 * * 1-5 — minute 0, hour 9, any day/month, Monday–Friday.

Why didn’t my cron run?

Top causes: wrong timezone (server time ≠ your time), the cron daemon not running, or day-of-month AND day-of-week both restricted (it’s OR, not AND).

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