Execute Every Friday Evening at 6:30 PM | CronBase

cron expression Standard
$ 30 18 * * 5

Every Friday evening at half past six.

The `30 18 * * 5` cron expression schedules a task to run once a week on Friday evenings at exactly 6:30 PM. This cadence is ideal for executing end-of-week processes, system backups, or compiling weekly business intelligence reports before the weekend starts.

Minute
30
Hour
18
Day of Month
*
Month
*
Day of Week
5
How it works

Next 5 Runs

  • in 5d 19h
  • in 12d 19h
  • in 19d 19h
  • in 26d 19h
  • in 33d 19h

* Tools

Code & Implementations

Bash
#!/usr/bin/env bash
# Add this line to your crontab using 'crontab -e'
# 30 18 * * 5 /usr/local/bin/weekly_cleanup.sh >> /var/log/weekly_cleanup.log 2>&1

set -euo pipefail

LOG_FILE="/var/log/weekly_cleanup.log"
echo "[$(date -u +'%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ')] Starting Friday evening maintenance..." >> "$LOG_FILE"

# Execute your production task here
if /usr/local/bin/perform_backup; then
    echo "[$(date -u +'%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ')] Maintenance completed successfully." >> "$LOG_FILE"
else
    echo "[$(date -u +'%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ')] ERROR: Maintenance failed!" >> "$LOG_FILE"
    exit 1
fi
Setup notes

Save the script to /usr/local/bin/weekly_cleanup.sh, make it executable with chmod +x, and append the cron schedule to your system crontab.

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Platform Equivalents

AWS EventBridge

Standard cron expressions often need conversion for AWS EventBridge schedules.

EventBridge Rule
cron(30 18 ? * 5 *)

Systemd Timer

OnCalendarFri *-*-* 18:30:00

my-task.timer
[Unit]
Description=Timer for cron expression: 30 18 * * 5

[Timer]
OnCalendar=Fri *-*-* 18:30:00
Persistent=true

[Install]
WantedBy=timers.target

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Frequently Asked Questions

How does daylight saving time affect this Friday 6:30 PM schedule?

Standard cron daemons run on system time. If your server is set to a local timezone that observes DST, the execution will shift relative to UTC twice a year. To prevent this, configure your servers or cron runners to use UTC exclusively.

What happens if the server is offline at 18:30 on Friday?

Standard cron does not catch up on missed executions. If your system is offline during the scheduled time, the task will not run until the following Friday. Use tools like anacron or robust queuing engines if missed-run execution is critical.

Can I run this job on both Thursday and Friday evenings?

Yes, you can modify the day-of-week field to include multiple days. Changing the expression to `30 18 * * 4,5` will execute the task at 6:30 PM on both Thursday and Friday.

Is 5 always interpreted as Friday across all cron engines?

In standard UNIX cron and most modern engines like systemd, Kubernetes, and robfig/cron, 5 represents Friday (with 0 or 7 as Sunday). However, always verify your specific environment's dialect, as some non-standard schedulers may use different indexing.

How should I handle on-call alerts for failures on Friday evening?

Since this job executes at 6:30 PM on Friday, failures may occur outside normal business hours. Ensure your alerting system (like PagerDuty) routes notifications to the designated weekend on-call engineer rather than the weekday team.

* Explore

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