Every 4 Hours

Use in your stack

# Run every 4 hours
0 */4 * * * /usr/local/bin/sync-job.sh

{ "cron": "0 0 */4 * * ?", "timezone": "UTC" }

apiVersion: batch/v1
kind: CronJob
metadata:
  name: four-hourly
spec:
  schedule: "0 */4 * * *"
  timeZone: "UTC"
  jobTemplate:
    spec:
      template:
        spec:
          containers:
          - name: job
            image: my-image:latest
          restartPolicy: OnFailure

cron(0 */4 * * ? *)

@Scheduled(cron = "0 0 */4 * * *", zone = "UTC")
public void every4Hours() { /* ... */ }

on:
  schedule:
    - cron: '0 */4 * * *'

Next runs

Pick a timezone to see when this expression fires next.

Variations

Common use cases

• Mid-frequency data syncs between systems that drift slowly.
• Refreshing OAuth tokens or signed URLs with a multi-hour lifetime.
• Batch report generation six times a day.
• Partial cache warming or incremental reindexing.

Gotchas

• `*/4` on the hour field fires at 0, 4, 8, 12, 16, 20 — it does **not** continue to 24. The hour field is 0–23, so it wraps to the next day's 00:00, giving an even 4-hour spacing.
• AWS EventBridge: `0 */4 * * ? *`. Quartz: `0 0 */4 * * ?` (seconds field first).
• Aligns to UTC midnight by default — on a non-UTC server the wall-clock times shift. Pin the timezone explicitly if alignment matters.

Frequently asked questions