Understand and build cron expressions
Cron expressions control scheduled jobs, but the five-field syntax is easy to get wrong. This tool explains any crontab schedule in plain English as you type, and breaks it into its minute, hour, day, month, and weekday fields so you can see exactly what each part does. Start from a preset like "every 5 minutes" or "weekdays at 6pm" and tweak it from there.
How cron syntax works
A standard cron expression has five fields separated by spaces: minute (0 to 59), hour (0 to 23), day of month (1 to 31), month (1 to 12), and day of week (0 to 6, where 0 is Sunday). An asterisk means "every", a slash sets a step like every 5 minutes, a dash sets a range, and a comma lists specific values.
Frequently asked questions
What does a cron expression mean?
It defines when a scheduled job runs. Paste one here and the tool describes it in plain English, for example "At 9:00 am on Monday."
How do I write a cron job for every 5 minutes?
Use */5 * * * *. You can also click the "Every 5 minutes" preset to fill it in.
What do the five fields mean?
In order they are minute, hour, day of month, month, and day of week. The tool labels each field so you can see how your schedule breaks down.
Does this run my cron job?
No. It only explains and builds the expression. Copy it into your server's crontab or scheduler to actually schedule the job.