Cron Expression Explainer
Paste any 5-field cron expression to get a plain-English explanation and its next run times.
Common examples (click to try)
*/5 * * * * | Every 5 minutes |
0 * * * * | Every hour, on the hour |
0 9 * * 1-5 | 9:00 on weekdays |
0 0 * * 0 | Midnight every Sunday |
0 3 1 * * | 3:00 on the 1st of each month |
Next runs are computed in UTC and shown in both UTC and your local timezone. Standard 5-field cron; seconds fields and @keywords are not supported.
How it works
The classic cron gotcha: when you restrict both day-of-month and day-of-week
(like 0 0 1 * 1), cron fires when either matches — the 1st of the month
OR every Monday — not when both do. This tool applies that standard OR rule
when computing next runs, which is exactly how Linux cron, Kubernetes
CronJobs, and GitHub Actions behave. Click any example to load it and see
the explanation update live.
FAQ
What are the 5 fields?
In order: minute (0–59), hour (0–23), day of month (1–31), month (1–12 or JAN–DEC), and day of week (0–7 or SUN–SAT, where both 0 and 7 mean Sunday). A * means 'every value'.
What does */5 mean?
A step: 'every 5th value' — so */5 in the minute field fires at :00, :05, :10 and so on. Steps combine with ranges too: 1-30/10 means 1, 11, and 21.
What timezone are the next runs shown in?
The schedule is evaluated in UTC (what most servers and CI systems use), and each run is shown in both UTC and your local time. If your crontab runs in a different server timezone, shift accordingly.