Cron Cheat Sheet
Cron expression syntax explained. Fields, special characters, common schedules, and examples — the quick reference for crontab and CI/CD schedulers.
Cron Fields
| Field 1: Minute | 0–59 |
| Field 2: Hour | 0–23 |
| Field 3: Day of Month | 1–31 |
| Field 4: Month | 1–12 (or JAN–DEC) |
| Field 5: Day of Week | 0–6 (0 = Sunday, or SUN–SAT) |
Special Characters
| * | Any value (every) |
| , | Value list separator (1,3,5) |
| - | Range of values (1-5) |
| / | Step values (*/5 = every 5) |
Common Schedules
| * * * * * | Every minute |
| */5 * * * * | Every 5 minutes |
| 0 * * * * | Every hour (on the hour) |
| 0 */2 * * * | Every 2 hours |
| 0 9 * * * | Daily at 9:00 AM |
| 0 9 * * 1-5 | Weekdays at 9:00 AM |
| 0 0 * * 0 | Weekly on Sunday at midnight |
| 0 0 1 * * | Monthly on the 1st at midnight |
| 0 0 1 1 * | Yearly on January 1st at midnight |
| 30 4 * * * | Daily at 4:30 AM |
| 0 9,17 * * * | Twice daily at 9 AM and 5 PM |
| 0 0 * * 1 | Every Monday at midnight |
Special Strings (some systems)
| @reboot | Run once at startup |
| @hourly | Equivalent to 0 * * * * |
| @daily | Equivalent to 0 0 * * * |
| @weekly | Equivalent to 0 0 * * 0 |
| @monthly | Equivalent to 0 0 1 * * |
| @yearly | Equivalent to 0 0 1 1 * |
Try It Live
Test these patterns with our free Cron Parser. No signup needed.
Open Cron Parser →
Step-by-Step Guide
Read Guide →