Cron Expression Parser
Parse cron expressions into plain English, see the next 10 run times, and build expressions interactively.
How to Parse Cron Expressions
Enter a five-field cron expression (minute, hour, day-of-month, month, day-of-week) and the tool instantly translates it into plain English and calculates the next 10 scheduled run times. This is invaluable for verifying that your cron job will fire when you expect. You can also use the interactive builder: select values from dropdowns for each field and the cron expression updates automatically. The builder is especially helpful if you are new to cron syntax or need to construct complex schedules with ranges and step values.
Understanding Cron Syntax
Cron uses five fields separated by spaces: minute (0-59), hour (0-23), day of month (1-31), month (1-12), and day of week (0-6, where 0 is Sunday). Special characters include * (any), , (list), - (range), and / (step). For example, */15 9-17 * * 1-5 means every 15 minutes from 9 AM to 5 PM on weekdays. This tool supports standard five-field cron only (not the extended six-field format with seconds). All computation runs in your browser using JavaScript date arithmetic.