dragonmantank/cron-expression — PHP cron parser guide

<?php
require 'vendor/autoload.php';
use Cron\CronExpression;

$cron = new CronExpression('0 9 * * 1-5');

// Is the cron due right now?
if ($cron->isDue()) {
    runJob();
}

// When does it fire next?
$next = $cron->getNextRunDate();
echo $next->format('Y-m-d H:i'); // e.g. "2026-04-27 09:00"

// Multi-step preview
foreach ($cron->getMultipleRunDates(5) as $date) {
    echo $date->format('Y-m-d H:i') . "\n";
}

<?php
// app/Console/Kernel.php

protected function schedule(Schedule $schedule)
{
    $schedule->command('reports:daily')
             ->dailyAt('09:00')
             ->timezone('America/New_York');

    $schedule->command('billing:close-month')
             ->lastDayOfMonth();   // → '0 0 L * *'

    $schedule->command('cleanup:hourly')
             ->cron('15 * * * *'); // raw cron expression
}

Laravel's named helpers compile to cron expressions under the hood. lastDayOfMonth() uses L, which the underlying parser supports.

<?php

use Symfony\Component\Scheduler\Attribute\AsSchedule;
use Symfony\Component\Scheduler\Schedule;
use Symfony\Component\Scheduler\ScheduleProviderInterface;
use Symfony\Component\Scheduler\Trigger\CronExpressionTrigger;

#[AsSchedule('default')]
final class DefaultSchedule implements ScheduleProviderInterface
{
    public function getSchedule(): Schedule
    {
        return (new Schedule())
            ->add(
                CronExpressionTrigger::fromSpec('0 9 * * 1-5')
                    ->message(new MorningDigestMessage()),
                CronExpressionTrigger::fromSpec('0 0 L * *')
                    ->message(new MonthEndMessage()),
            );
    }
}

• L — last day of month or last weekday-of-month.
• LW — last weekday of the month.
• W — nearest weekday to the given day-of-month.
• ? — no specific value (compatibility token).
• # — Nth weekday of month, e.g. 2#1 = first Monday.

• Default timezone — `getNextRunDate()` uses the PHP default timezone. Set it via date_default_timezone_set or pass an explicit DateTimeZone.
• Laravel scheduler precision — runs every minute via a single OS cron, so jobs fire somewhere in their target minute (not at the exact second).
• Backward-compat with v1 — older versions used CronExpression::factory(). New code uses new CronExpression(...).