Cron Expression Parser
Decode a cron expression into plain English, see the next run times in your local time zone, and inspect each field. Supports 5- and 6-field crons with ranges, lists, steps and names.
6/24/2026, 9:00:00 AMin 2h6/25/2026, 9:00:00 AMin 1d6/26/2026, 9:00:00 AMin 2d6/29/2026, 9:00:00 AMin 5d6/30/2026, 9:00:00 AMin 6d7/1/2026, 9:00:00 AMin 7d| Minute | 0 | minute 0 |
| Hour | 9 | hour 9 |
| Day of month | * | every day |
| Month | * | every month |
| Day of week | 1-5 | weekday 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5 |
About the cron expression parser
Updated June 2026 · 100% client-side — your data never leaves your browser.
Paste a cron expression and Bytewrench explains it in plain English, shows the next several run times in your local time zone, and breaks down each field. It understands standard 5-field crons plus optional 6-field (with seconds), and supports ranges, lists, steps (*/n) and month/day names like JAN and MON.
It's the quickest way to sanity-check a schedule before committing it to a crontab, CI pipeline or scheduler — and it runs entirely in your browser.
See also: Unix timestamp converter
Turns cryptic expressions into a readable sentence.
Computes the upcoming executions in your local time, with relative timing.
Ranges, lists, steps, names (JAN/MON) and optional seconds field.
Common schedules you can load and tweak.
Frequently asked questions
What are the 5 cron fields?
In order: minute (0-59), hour (0-23), day of month (1-31), month (1-12), and day of week (0-6, where Sunday is 0 — and 7 also means Sunday). An optional sixth field added at the front represents seconds.
How do I write 'every 5 minutes' in cron?
Use */5 * * * * — the */5 in the minute field means 'every 5th minute', and the asterisks leave every hour, day, month and weekday unrestricted. Paste it here and the tool confirms the next run times.
What's the difference between */5 and 5 in cron?
In the minute field, 5 means exactly at minute 5 of every hour (so once an hour), while */5 means every 5 minutes (at :00, :05, :10 and so on). The asterisk-slash is a step, the bare number is a single fixed value.
What does a cron expression mean?
Each field restricts when the job runs, and the job fires only at moments where all fields match. Paste your expression above and the tool turns it into a plain-English sentence and lists the next several run times so you can confirm the schedule before deploying.
Are the run times in my time zone?
Yes. The next run times are computed and shown in your browser's local time zone, so remember your server may use UTC.