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DevOps Tool

Cron Expression Generator & Parser

Parse, generate, and validate cron expressions with instant human-readable descriptions and next scheduled run times. This free online crontab tool supports standard 5-field Unix cron syntax used in Linux crontab, Kubernetes CronJobs, GitHub Actions, Jenkins, and CI/CD pipelines. Enter a cron expression or use presets to build your schedule. A powerful alternative to crontab.guru — all processing runs in your browser.

cron-parser.tool
*/5 * * * *
Every 5 minutes

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a cron expression and how does it work?
A cron expression is a string of five space-separated fields that defines a recurring schedule: minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week. Each field accepts specific values, ranges (1-5), wildcards (*), or step values (*/5). For example, 0 9 * * 1-5 means "at 9:00 AM, Monday through Friday." Cron originated in Unix but is now used in Kubernetes CronJobs, GitHub Actions, Jenkins, AWS CloudWatch, and many CI/CD systems.
How do I schedule a cron job to run every 5 minutes?
Use: */5 * * * *. The */5 in the minute field is a step value meaning "every 5th minute." Similarly: */10 * * * * for every 10 minutes, */15 * * * * for every 15 minutes, 0 * * * * for the top of every hour, and 0 */2 * * * for every 2 hours at minute 0.
What are the five fields in a cron expression?
1. Minute (0–59) — 2. Hour (0–23) — 3. Day of month (1–31) — 4. Month (1–12 or JAN–DEC) — 5. Day of week (0–7 or SUN–SAT, where both 0 and 7 = Sunday). Some extended cron systems (Quartz, AWS) add a 6th field for seconds and a 7th for year, but standard Unix cron uses exactly five fields.
What is the difference between standard cron and Quartz cron?
Standard (Unix) cron has 5 fields: minute, hour, day-of-month, month, day-of-week. Quartz cron (Java's Quartz Scheduler) has 6–7 fields adding seconds and optionally year. Quartz also supports special characters: L (last day), W (nearest weekday), # (nth weekday of month), and ? (no specific value). This tool parses standard 5-field Unix cron expressions.
Can I use cron expressions on Windows?
Windows doesn't natively support cron syntax — it uses Task Scheduler with its own GUI/XML format. However: WSL (Windows Subsystem for Linux) supports standard cron, and many cross-platform tools like Jenkins, GitHub Actions, Kubernetes, and Docker use cron expressions regardless of the host OS. You can also use Node.js libraries like node-cron on Windows.

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