Cron expression for every 12 hours
At minute 0 past every 12th hour
0
minute
*/12
hour
*
day (month)
*
month
*
day (week)
At minute 0 past every 12th hour
Try this expression in the interactive tool:
Open in cron explainer →Next 10 scheduled runs
#1Tue, 21 Apr 2026, 00:00
#2Tue, 21 Apr 2026, 12:00
#3Wed, 22 Apr 2026, 00:00
#4Wed, 22 Apr 2026, 12:00
#5Thu, 23 Apr 2026, 00:00
#6Thu, 23 Apr 2026, 12:00
#7Fri, 24 Apr 2026, 00:00
#8Fri, 24 Apr 2026, 12:00
#9Sat, 25 Apr 2026, 00:00
#10Sat, 25 Apr 2026, 12:00
Common use cases
Twice daily — at midnight and noon — is a practical schedule for tasks that need to run more than once a day but where 6-hourly is overkill. Common applications include generating mid-day and end-of-day reports, running twice-daily backup verifications, and syncing data between systems on a half-day cadence.
This schedule is also used for certificate monitoring, DNS propagation checks, and sending bi-daily digest emails to stakeholders who want updates without being overwhelmed.
Platform-specific syntax
crontab
0 */12 * * * /path/to/script.shAWS EventBridge
cron(0 0/12 * * ? *)GitHub Actions
schedule:
- cron: '0 */12 * * *'Kubernetes
schedule: "0 */12 * * *"Technical breakdown
The expression 0 */12 * * * has five fields: minute=0, hour=*/12, day (month)=*, month=*, day (week)=*. At minute 0 past every 12th hour.
Frequently asked questions
What times does 0 */12 * * * run?
00:00 (midnight) and 12:00 (noon) — twice per day.