What does the cron expression 0 0 * * 6 mean?

The cron expression 0 0 * * 6 schedules a job to run every Saturday. The five fields represent: minute, hour, day of month, month, and day of week.

How do I schedule a cron job to run every Saturday?

Add this line to your crontab: 0 0 * * 6 /path/to/command. Open your crontab for editing with crontab -e and paste the expression followed by your command.

How do I monitor a cron job that runs every Saturday?

Add a heartbeat check: 0 0 * * 6 /path/to/script.sh && curl -fsS https://cronsignal.io/ping/YOUR_CHECK_ID. You'll be alerted if the job doesn't run on schedule.

Cron Every Saturday — Weekly Saturday Cron Job

Understanding the Expression

The cron expression 0 0 * * 6 breaks down as follows:

Field	Value	Meaning
Minute	0	At minute 0
Hour	0	At midnight (00:00)
Day of month	*	Every day of the month
Month	*	Every month
Day of week	6	Saturday

Example Usage

Basic crontab entry

0 0 * * 6 /path/to/your/script.sh

With output logging

0 0 * * 6 /path/to/script.sh >> /var/log/script.log 2>&1

With monitoring

0 0 * * 6 /path/to/script.sh && curl -fsS https://cronsignal.io/ping/YOUR_CHECK_ID

Common Use Cases for Every Saturday

Weekly backups: Create full system backups
Maintenance tasks: Run database optimization and cleanup
Weekly reports: Generate comprehensive weekly summaries
Security scans: Run vulnerability and compliance checks

Platform Equivalents

The same schedule expressed across common platforms and schedulers:

Platform	Syntax
Linux crontab	`0 0 * * 6`
GitHub Actions	`- cron: '0 0 * * 6'`
systemd timer	`OnCalendar=Sat --* 00:00:00`
Kubernetes CronJob	`schedule: "0 0 * * 6"`
AWS EventBridge	`cron(0 0 ? * SAT *)`

Timezone Considerations

Saturday midnight UTC is Friday 7-8 PM in US timezones. If your job should run on the weekend in local time, add the UTC offset to the hour.

Common Mistakes

Day 6 = Saturday: In cron, 0=Sunday, 1=Monday through 6=Saturday. Some implementations also accept 7=Sunday.
Weekly jobs skip missed runs: If the server is down at midnight Saturday, most cron daemons skip that run entirely. Use a heartbeat monitor to confirm it ran.
AWS EventBridge: Uses day names with a year field: cron(0 0 ? * SAT *).

Cron Every Saturday