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n8n · free tool · no signup · runs in your browser

n8n cron expression builder

Paste the expression you are about to put in a Schedule Trigger node. This page tells you what it means in plain English, when it will actually fire in the timezone your instance uses, and how many executions it burns in 30 days — the number that decides your n8n bill. n8n’s cron field takes five fields, or six when you set seconds, and the seconds field comes first: the node’s own hint reads Format: ([Second]) [Minute] [Hour] [Day of Month] [Month] [Day of Week].

Explain a cron expression

Five fields (min hour day month weekday) or six with seconds in front. Names work too: 0 15 * 1 sun.

In plain English

Next 8 runs

    Schedule Trigger node — paste onto the n8n canvas

    Everything above is computed in your browser by /tools/cron.js — no request leaves the page, and there is no third-party script on it. Next-run times are converted with the browser’s own timezone database, and were checked against the European daylight-saving change on 25 October 2026 (a 0 2 * * * job correctly stays at 02:00 local across the switch).

    The ten expressions n8n documents

    Select one to load it above. This is n8n’s own examples table from the Schedule Trigger documentation, read on 6 September 2026.

    TypeCron expressionn8n’s description
    Every X Seconds Every 10 seconds.
    Every X Minutes Every 5 minutes.
    Hourly Every hour on the hour.
    Daily At 6:00 AM every day.
    Weekly At noon every Monday.
    Monthly At midnight on the 1st of every month.
    Every X Days At midnight every 3rd day.
    Only Weekdays At 9:00 AM Monday through Friday.
    Custom Hourly Range Every hour from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM every day.
    Quarterly At midnight on the 1st of January, April, July, and October.

    The six fields

    PositionFieldRangeNotes
    1 (optional)Second0–59Only present in a 6-field expression. Omit it and n8n treats the run as being at second 0.
    2Minute0–59—
    3Hour0–2324-hour clock, in the workflow or instance timezone.
    4Day of month1–31Combined with day of week as an OR when both are set.
    5Month1–12 or jan–dec—
    6Day of week0–6 or sun–satSunday is 0; 7 also works. n8n’s field placeholder uses a name: 0 15 * 1 sun.

    Field names and order from n8n’s documentation table and the node source, read on 6 September 2026. The docs put it plainly: “The sixth asterisk in the Cron expression represents seconds. Setting this is optional. The node will execute even if you don’t set the value for seconds.”

    Why the 30-day count matters

    n8n meters executions, not steps. Its pricing page defines an execution as a single run of your entire workflow. It doesn’t matter how many steps are in the workflow or how much data it processes. A Schedule Trigger therefore costs one execution per tick even when the run finds nothing to do — which is why a polling schedule, not a big workflow, is what blows a plan.

    A worked example: */15 * * * * is 2,880 runs in a 30-day month. The Starter plan includes 2,500 executions, so that one expression is already over the plan before you add a second workflow. Move it to hourly and it is 720. Our n8n pricing page works the same arithmetic across every plan and every template in our library.

    Cheapest fix for a schedule that is too expensive: ask whether the source can push instead of you polling. A webhook costs one execution per real event — see the webhook JSON API template — while a poll costs one per tick forever.

    Putting the expression into n8n

    1. Add a Schedule Trigger nodeOn the canvas, add the trigger and set Trigger Interval to Custom (Cron). The Expression field appears underneath.
    2. Paste the expressionOr paste the node JSON from the box above straight onto the canvas — n8n accepts a pasted workflow fragment as a node.
    3. Set the timezone before you publishWorkflow settings override the instance default. If you leave it, a self-hosted instance uses America/New_York per the docs, which is rarely what a European or Asian team means by “9am”.
    4. Publish the workflown8n’s Schedule Trigger docs are explicit: “If a workflow uses the Schedule node as a trigger, make sure that you save and publish the workflow.” An unpublished schedule never fires.

    Importing a whole workflow rather than building one? The import guide covers the file route, “Could not import file” covers it going wrong, and the template library has scheduled workflows that need no credentials — the RSS reader is the obvious one to test a cron against.

    Sources and last verified

    Field order, examples and timezone behaviour read from the pages below on 6 September 2026.

    Frequently asked questions

    How many fields does an n8n cron expression have?

    Five, or six if you want to control seconds. n8n’s Schedule Trigger node shows the hint “Format: ([Second]) [Minute] [Hour] [Day of Month] [Month] [Day of Week]”, and the docs add that the extra field represents seconds and is optional: the node runs even if you leave it out. So */10 * * * * * is every ten seconds, while */10 * * * * is every ten minutes — the same digits, a hundred times the executions.

    What timezone does an n8n cron expression run in?

    Not UTC by default. n8n uses the workflow timezone if one is set, otherwise the instance timezone. The docs say the self-hosted default is America/New_York, while n8n Cloud tries to detect the owner’s timezone at signup and falls back to GMT. Self-hosted instances change it with the GENERIC_TIMEZONE environment variable. Set the timezone selector above to the timezone your instance actually uses, or the times below will be right for the wrong clock.

    Why does my hourly workflow cost more than I expected?

    Because n8n counts one execution every time the trigger fires, whether or not the workflow finds anything to do. A Schedule Trigger set to every 15 minutes is 2,880 runs in a 30-day month, which is more than the 2,500 executions a Starter plan includes — for a single workflow that may do nothing most of the time. The counter above shows this figure for whatever expression you paste.

    Does this tool send my expression anywhere?

    No. The parser, the next-run calculation and the timezone conversion all run in your browser from one static JavaScript file on this domain. There is no API call, no third-party script and no CDN — you can confirm it with the network tab open, or read /tools/cron.js directly.

    What happens to a cron run when day-of-month and day-of-week are both set?

    They act as an OR, not an AND: the run happens on either match. 0 12 1 * 1 means noon on the 1st of the month and noon every Monday, not only on Mondays that fall on the 1st. This tool follows that rule, which is standard cron behaviour and the reason expressions like that fire far more often than people expect.

    Can I use names instead of numbers?

    Yes for months and weekdays — the Expression field’s own placeholder in the n8n source is “eg. 0 15 * 1 sun”. jan–dec and sun–sat both work, in any case. Sunday can be written as 0 or 7. This tool accepts all of those and prints back the days it understood, so you can check it read what you meant.