This page will help you quickly and easily set up a cron job to run once per week on Friday.
The Cron Job/Crontab
To have your task run at this frequency, use the following cron:
0 0 * * 5
This cron command translates to the following (in Human-Readable format):
“Once per week on Friday.”
What is a Cron Job & Crontab?
A cron job is a task that is scheduled to run at a specific time or interval. Cron jobs are commonly used to automate system maintenance or administration tasks, such as running backups or sending emails.
A crontab is a file containing commands and instructions for the cron daemon to execute.
Cron Fields
Every cron job uses five fields. Here is an explanation of what each field does in this cron, which runs “once per week on Friday“:
- Field 1: (0) indicates that the task will be run at minute 0.
- Field 2: (0) indicates that the task will be run at hour 0 (12 am).
- Field 3: (*) indicates that the task will be run every day of the month.
- Field 4: (*) indicates that the task will be run every month.
- Field 5: (5) indicates that the task will be run every Friday.
FUN FACT: If a cron job is not properly configured, it might never execute – so make sure you double-check your settings before setting one up!.
Use Cases
You might want to set up a crontab or cron job to run once per week on Friday for several reasons, including:
- change a website’s front page every week
- send a weekly newsletter to subscribers
- generate reports on website usage statistics
- backup databases
Similar Cron Jobs
You might also want to run a crontab:
- once per week on Wednesday
- once per week on Saturday
- once per week on Sunday
- once per week on Tuesday
- once per week on Thursday
- once per day on Monday to Saturday
- once per day on Tuesday to Friday
- once per day on Monday to Thursday
FUN FACT: If you need to delete a cron job, simply remove the corresponding line from the crontab file and save your changes..
Wrapping Up
In this article, you learned how to set up a cron job that runs once per week on Friday. 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.