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Cron Expression Parser

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Free cron expression parser for standard 5-field schedules - plain-English meaning plus the next five local run times in your browser.

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Cron expression
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Parses standard 5-field cron (minute–weekday), shows a plain-English description and the next five local run times. Not a visual cron builder - use Cron Expression Generator to construct schedules.

See more about the Cron Expression Parser

Examples

Weekday mornings

0 9 * * 1-5 → weekdays at 09:00 · next five local runs listed

When both day-of-month and day-of-week are constrained, classic cron ORs them - the description makes that explicit.

Build instead of parse?

Use Cron Expression Generator for point-and-click schedules, then paste back here to verify next runs

Five fields only (minute through weekday). No seconds field and no sub-minute cadence.

Key features

  • Plain-English explanation
  • Next five local runs
  • Standard 5-field cron

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Quick answers for Cron Expression Parser

What does the Cron Expression Parser do?
The Cron Expression Parser takes any 5-field cron expression and shows you what it means in plain English, plus the next five times it will run, so you catch mistakes before you deploy.
What cron syntax does the parser support?
The Cron Expression Parser supports standard 5-field cron (minute, hour, day-of-month, month, day-of-week) with wildcards, ranges, lists, and step values - the dialect used by vixie-cron, cronie, and most Linux systems.
Why does my cron expression match both a day-of-month AND a day-of-week?
Standard cron OR's the two date fields whenever both are non-wildcard, so `0 9 15 * 1` runs on the 15th OR on Mondays - not "the 15th if it's a Monday". The Cron Expression Parser makes that explicit in the plain-English output.
Is sub-minute scheduling supported?
No - cron's minimum resolution is one minute. For faster cadence you need a systemd timer or a long-running daemon. The Cron Expression Parser flags any expression that tries to fake sub-minute scheduling.
Does the Cron Expression Parser respect timezones?
The parser computes run times in your local timezone so you can sanity-check them, but remember that cron on a server runs in the server's timezone unless you set CRON_TZ at the top of the crontab.