Cron5 min read

Cron Special Characters (*, /, -, ?, L, W)

A complete guide to wildcards, steps, ranges, and extended syntax characters in cron expressions.

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Special characters allow cron expressions to express repeating intervals, ranges, and conditional dates without listing every value explicitly.

Standard Wildcards

  • * (Asterisk / All): Matches every possible value in that field. * in the minute field means "every minute".
  • , (Comma / List): Specifies a list of values. 1,15,30 in the minute field runs at minutes 1, 15, and 30.
  • - (Hyphen / Range): Specifies an inclusive range. 9-17 in the hour field means every hour from 9:00 AM to 5:00 PM.
  • / (Slash / Step): Specifies increments. */15 in minutes runs every 15 minutes (0, 15, 30, 45).

Extended Characters (Quartz, AWS, Jenkins)

  • ? (No Specific Value): Used when specifying day-of-month and leaving day-of-week unconstrained.
  • L (Last): "Last day of the month" in day-of-month, or "last Friday" (5L) in day-of-week.
  • W (Weekday): Nearest weekday to a given calendar day (e.g. 15W).
  • # (Nth Weekday): 5#3 specifies the 3rd Friday of the month.