I have the cron job as shown below, and wanted it to run every 2 hours, but it keeps running every 2 minutes.
Can someone tell me where I'm going wrong?
* */2 * * * /path-to-script 
- crontab.guru/every-2-hoursccpizza– ccpizza2017-11-13 21:02:14 +00:00Commented Nov 13, 2017 at 21:02
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4 Answers
An asterisk in the minute (first) field tells it to run every minute, regardless of the other fields.
You need to specify an exact minute to run within the hour. Be that on the hour (0), half past (30), etc..
0 */2 * * * /path-to-script 
The correct description of what you had
* */2 * * * /path-to-script is "run every minute where the hour is a multiple of 2".
Which means 00:00 to 00:59, 02:00 to 02:59, 04:00 to 04:59, ... and so on. Not quite the same as "run every minute". The solution already given is valid though.
Off the top of my head, you could try specifying all the hours when it should run:
0 0,2,4,6,8,10,12,14,16,18,20,22 * * * /path-to-script 
- 3*/2 is much cleanerDavid Pashley– David Pashley2009-07-21 13:39:00 +00:00Commented Jul 21, 2009 at 13:39
- 11*/2 while cleaner, is not portable... does not work on solaris and likely most other unix variants.ericslaw– ericslaw2009-07-21 14:26:00 +00:00Commented Jul 21, 2009 at 14:26
- 1Good to know. This options has the ability to ignore some of the hours which we may not need to execute the cron.Muneer– Muneer2014-06-08 06:35:49 +00:00Commented Jun 8, 2014 at 6:35
Also you can do this:
0 0-23/2 * * * /path/to/the/script or if you want to be more specific on every 2 hours, you can use:
0 0,2,4,6,8,10,12,14,16,18,20,22 * * * /path/to/the/script The hours values should be separated by commas.
- This should be acepted as well:
0 0-23/2 * * *1n5aN1aC– 1n5aN1aC2019-09-03 16:49:47 +00:00Commented Sep 3, 2019 at 16:49