What is the cron expression for 9 AM every day?

0 9 * * *, which runs at 09:00 in the scheduler’s time zone every day.

How do I set a cron job for 9 AM in a specific time zone?

In cronie, put CRON_TZ=Europe/London on the line above. In Kubernetes, set spec.timeZone. In GitHub Actions, add timezone next to cron.

How do I run at 9 AM and 5 PM?

0 9,17 * * * runs at 09:00 and 17:00 every day.

Cron schedule

Cron every day at 9 AM

The cron expression for every day at 9 AM is 0 9 * * *: minute 0 of hour 9, every day of the week. Whether that’s your 9 AM depends on the scheduler’s time zone.

Every day at 9 AM
Expression	`0 9 * * *`
Runs	365 times in 2027
systemd OnCalendar	`--* 09:00:00`

How it works

9 in the hour field with 0 in the minute field is 09:00. Morning-start jobs are where time zones bite hardest, because the whole point is that people see the result when they start work.

Each platform handles the zone differently. cronie reads CRON_TZ=America/New_York above the line; Kubernetes takes spec.timeZone; GitHub Actions accepts timezone next to cron; Vercel and Cloudflare are UTC only, so you convert by hand and live with DST shifts.

For 9 AM New York on a UTC-only scheduler you’d write 0 13 * * * in summer and 0 14 * * * in winter. For 9 AM in São Paulo, which has had no DST since 2019, 0 12 * * * works all year.

Field-by-field breakdown
Field	Value	Meaning
Minute	`0`	minute 0 (on the hour)
Hour	`9`	hour 9 (9 AM)
Day of month	`*`	every day of the month
Month	`*`	every month
Day of week	`*`	every day of the week

Next runs

Scheduler clock

As on GitHub Actions without timezone, Vercel, Cloudflare and Kubernetes with timeZone "Etc/UTC".

Next run times, computed in your browser from the current time
Run	Your time	UTC
1	Calculating…
2
3
4
5

Ready-to-paste versions

The same schedule for each scheduler, with what differs on each one.

crontab (Linux, macOS, BSD)

crontab -e

# m h dom mon dow  command
0 9 * * * /usr/local/bin/job.sh >> /var/log/job.log 2>&1

cron uses the server’s time zone. On cronie (Fedora, RHEL), a CRON_TZ=Europe/London line above the entry changes the zone for the entries below it.

GitHub Actions

.github/workflows/scheduled.yml

on:
  schedule:
    - cron: '0 9 * * *'
      # timezone: 'America/New_York'  # optional; UTC when omitted
  workflow_dispatch: {}

Runs in UTC unless you set timezone, and only on the default branch. GitHub’s docs warn that scheduled runs can be delayed at busy times and that schedules in public repositories are disabled after 60 days without activity.
The start of every hour is GitHub’s busiest slot. If the exact minute doesn’t matter, move the 0 to something like 17 to get picked up sooner.
With a timezone that observes DST, a time skipped by the spring-forward change advances to the next valid time (the docs’ example: 2:30 AM becomes 3:00 AM).

Kubernetes CronJob

cronjob.yaml

apiVersion: batch/v1
kind: CronJob
metadata:
  name: scheduled-job
spec:
  schedule: "0 9 * * *"
  timeZone: "Etc/UTC"
  concurrencyPolicy: Forbid
  jobTemplate:
    spec:
      template:
        spec:
          restartPolicy: OnFailure
          containers:
            - name: job
              image: busybox:1.36
              command: ["/bin/sh", "-c", "date; echo running"]

spec.timeZone is stable since Kubernetes 1.27; without it, the kube-controller-manager’s zone applies. concurrencyPolicy: Forbid skips a run while the previous Job is still active.

Vercel Cron Jobs

vercel.json

{
  "crons": [
    { "path": "/api/cron", "schedule": "0 9 * * *" }
  ]
}

Vercel always uses UTC, doesn’t accept names like MON or JAN, and won’t let you set both day of month and day of week.
This fits the Hobby plan, but Hobby precision is per hour: the invocation can land anywhere within the scheduled hour.

Cloudflare Workers

wrangler.toml

[triggers]
crons = ["0 9 * * *"]

Cron Triggers run on UTC. Changes can take up to 15 minutes to propagate across Cloudflare’s network.

node-cron (Node.js)

scheduler.js

import cron from 'node-cron';

// 6 fields: the first one (seconds) is optional
cron.schedule('0 0 9 * * *', async () => {
  await runJob();
}, { timezone: 'UTC', noOverlap: true });

The schedule lives inside the Node process: if it’s down, nothing runs, and three replicas run the job three times. noOverlap skips a tick while the previous run is still going.

systemd timer

job.timer + job.service

# /etc/systemd/system/job.timer
[Unit]
Description=Run job.service every day at 09:00

[Timer]
OnCalendar=*-*-* 09:00:00
Persistent=true

[Install]
WantedBy=timers.target

# /etc/systemd/system/job.service
[Service]
Type=oneshot
ExecStart=/usr/local/bin/job.sh

# systemctl daemon-reload && systemctl enable --now job.timer

Check it with systemd-analyze calendar '*-*-* 09:00:00', which prints the normalized form and the next elapse. AccuracySec defaults to 1min, so the start can drift by up to a minute.
Persistent=true runs the job at boot if the machine was off at the scheduled time, which plain cron doesn’t do.

Spring @Scheduled and Quartz

Java

@Scheduled(cron = "0 0 9 * * *", zone = "UTC")
public void runJob() {
    // ...
}

// Quartz CronTrigger:
CronScheduleBuilder.cronSchedule("0 0 9 * * ?")

In Spring, the first of the 6 fields is seconds; the rest follow standard cron (0 or 7 = Sunday).
In Quartz, one of the two day fields must be ?, so the day-of-week field gets it.

Pitfalls

DST moves a UTC schedule by an hour

If the scheduler is UTC and your office observes DST, “9 AM” becomes 8 AM or 10 AM local for half the year. Use a zone-aware scheduler, or run at both candidate UTC hours and exit early unless the local hour is 9.

Weekends included

0 9 * * * runs on Saturday and Sunday too. For workdays only, it’s 0 9 * * 1-5; see every weekday at 9 AM.

Early-morning local jobs and DST gaps

Jobs between 01:00 and 03:00 local time are the ones DST skips or repeats. 09:00 is safe from that, which is one more reason to prefer it over a 2 AM slot when the exact hour doesn’t matter.

Frequently asked questions

What is the cron expression for 9 AM every day?: 0 9 * * *, which runs at 09:00 in the scheduler’s time zone every day.
How do I set a cron job for 9 AM in a specific time zone?: In cronie, put CRON_TZ=Europe/London on the line above. In Kubernetes, set spec.timeZone. In GitHub Actions, add timezone next to cron.
How do I run at 9:30 AM every day?: 30 9 * * * runs at 09:30.
How do I run at 9 AM and 5 PM?: 0 9,17 * * * runs at 09:00 and 17:00 every day.

Last reviewed September 27, 2026 by Arielton Oberek.