Cron expression builder

What is a cron expression?

A cron expression is a compact scheduling format used across the Unix ecosystem. It consists of five fields — minute, hour, day of month, month, and day of week — that together define when a task should run. Cron powers everything from nightly database backups to hourly analytics jobs.

Cron expression syntax

• * — every value (e.g. every minute, every hour)
• 5 — a specific value (e.g. minute 5)
• 1,15 — multiple values (e.g. the 1st and 15th)
• 1-5 — a range (e.g. Monday through Friday)
• */10 — a step (e.g. every 10 minutes)

Common cron expressions

• * * * * * — every minute
• 0 * * * * — every hour at minute 0
• 0 0 * * * — every day at midnight
• 0 9 * * 1-5 — weekdays at 9 AM
• 0 0 1 * * — the 1st of every month at midnight
• */15 * * * * — every 15 minutes

Schedule database tasks with Basedash

If you're building cron expressions for database maintenance, reporting, or data sync jobs, Basedash can handle the scheduling and the query. Connect your database, set up a scheduled report, and let Basedash deliver the results to Slack, email, or a dashboard — no manual cron management needed.