Cron Format Comparison

Different platforms use different cron syntax. Here is how they compare.

Standard Unix (crontab)

5 fields

Field order

minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week

Example

*/5 * * * *

→ Every 5 minutes

The original and most widely used. 0=Sunday for day-of-week. No seconds, no year. Used by crontab, most Linux systems, and many libraries.

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Quartz Scheduler (Java)

6-7 fields

Field order

second minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week [year]

Example

0 */5 * * * ?

→ Every 5 minutes (with seconds=0)

Adds seconds as the first field and optional year as the last. Uses 1-7 for days (1=Sunday, not 0=Sunday). Requires ? in either day-of-month or day-of-week. Supports special chars: L (last), W (weekday), # (nth).

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AWS EventBridge / CloudWatch

6 fields

Field order

minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week year

Example

*/5 * * * ? *

→ Every 5 minutes

Appends year (not seconds). Requires ? in either day-of-month or day-of-week. Also supports rate expressions: rate(5 minutes). Always runs in UTC.

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Spring Boot (@Scheduled)

6 fields

Field order

second minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week

Example

0 */5 * * * *

→ Every 5 minutes

Same as Quartz but without the year field and without requiring ?. The seconds field is mandatory. Also supports fixedRate and fixedDelay (ms) as alternatives. Supports timezone via zone attribute.

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Azure Functions (NCronTab)

6 fields

Field order

second minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week

Example

0 */5 * * * *

→ Every 5 minutes

Same 6-field format as Spring. Used in Azure Functions timer triggers and Logic Apps. The seconds field enables sub-minute scheduling.

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Vercel Cron Jobs

5 fields

Field order

minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week

Example

*/5 * * * *

→ Every 5 minutes

Standard 5-field syntax. Configured in vercel.json. Hobby plan: 1hr minimum, 1 job. Pro plan: 1min minimum, 10 jobs. Always UTC. 30-second timeout.

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GitHub Actions

5 fields

Field order

minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week

Example

*/5 * * * *

→ Every 5 minutes (minimum interval)

Standard POSIX cron syntax. Minimum interval is 5 minutes. Schedules may be delayed during high load. Always runs in UTC. Only triggers on the default branch.

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Kubernetes CronJob

5 fields

Field order

minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week

Example

*/5 * * * *

→ Every 5 minutes

Standard 5-field syntax. Timezone support added in v1.27 (timeZone field). Key settings: concurrencyPolicy (Allow/Forbid/Replace), startingDeadlineSeconds, suspend.

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Databricks

5-7 (Quartz) fields

Field order

second minute hour day-of-month month day-of-week [year]

Example

0 */5 * * * ?

→ Every 5 minutes

Uses Quartz-style cron expressions. Supports ? wildcard and 1-7 day numbering. Used in job scheduling and notebook triggers.

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