This page will help you quickly and easily set up a cron job to run every minute between 4:00 am and 8:00 pm.
The Cron Job/Crontab
To have your task run at this frequency, use the following cron:
* 4-20 * * *
This cron command translates to the following (in Human-Readable format):
“Every minute between 4:00 am and 8:00 pm.”
What is a Cron Job & Crontab?
A cron job is a time-based task that is set to run at specific intervals. These jobs are usually used for maintenance or automation purposes. For example, a cron job could be set to delete temporary files every week so that they don’t take up space on the server.
A crontab (also known as a “cron table”) is a file that contains a list of commands that are executed at specified times.
Cron Fields
Every cron job uses five fields. Here is an explanation of what each field does in this cron, which runs “every minute between 4:00 am and 8:00 pm“:
FUN FACT: A common use for cron jobs is to generate periodic reports – for example, you could set up a cron job to automatically generate and send out a report on website traffic statistics every week..
Use Cases
You might want to set up a crontab or cron job to run every minute between 4:00 am and 8:00 pm for several reasons, including:
- Daily backups at 4:00 am
- A daily report is generated and emailed to the team every day at 5:00 pm
- A cron job runs every minute to check if any new files have been added to a directory
Similar Cron Jobs
You might also want to run a crontab:
- every 17 minutes
- every 23 minutes
- every 2 minutes
- every 18 minutes
- every minute between 3:00 am and 10:00 am
- every minute between 12:00 am and 12:00 pm
FUN FACT: One common use for cron jobs is to send out email reminders or notifications based on certain events (such as an upcoming deadline)..
Wrapping Up
In this article, you learned how to set up a cron job that runs every minute between 4:00 am and 8:00 pm. Please share this page with friends and colleagues if you find it useful.
If you have any questions, please don’t hesitate to comment below.
If you are looking for cron jobs that run at certain minutes, hours, days, weekdays, or months, or if you are looking for miscellaneous cron jobs, then check out our relevant sections, or visit our cron job cheat sheet for a list of hundreds of popular cron jobs.