Questions,
answered clearly.

CronEngine is an online cron job scheduler. It sends HTTP requests to any URL you configure on a schedule you define, so you can automate recurring tasks without relying on your own server's cron setup.

A cron job is a task that runs automatically at scheduled intervals. With CronEngine, a cron job works by sending an HTTP request to a URL such as https://example.com/run-task or a webhook endpoint, on the schedule you configure.

Jobs can run as often as once per minute on any paid plan. The free plan's monthly run allowance covers schedules down to roughly every 15 minutes. You can use the visual schedule builder for common intervals or write a raw cron expression like */15 * * * * for more advanced schedules.

Yes. CronEngine runs entirely from its own servers. Your browser, local computer, and hosting server do not need to stay online for jobs to fire.

All requests are sent from 45.9.188.216. If your endpoint is protected by a firewall or allowlist, make sure to whitelist this IP address so our requests are not blocked.

No, plain HTTP endpoints also work. That said, HTTPS is strongly recommended to keep your requests and response bodies secure in transit.

Yes. When creating or editing a job, CronEngine shows you a preview of upcoming execution times based on your schedule. This helps you catch mistakes before the job goes live.

No problem. next_run_at is recalculated immediately whenever you save a change, so the job will simply fire at the correct next time in the new timezone.

Every plan covers a number of scheduled runs per 30-day month, shared across all your active jobs. A job's cost is simply how often its schedule fires:

every minute = 43,200 runs/month
every 5 minutes = 8,640
every 15 minutes = 2,880
hourly = 720
daily = 30

The cost is reserved when you save the job, so your allowance never runs out unexpectedly in the middle of a month. Paused jobs do not count.

The free plan covers 5 active jobs, 5,000 scheduled runs a month, and a 20 second request timeout. That comfortably runs five hourly jobs, or a job every 15 minutes plus a few daily ones - plenty for personal projects and lightweight automation. Per-minute scheduling needs a paid plan, since a single every-minute job costs 43,200 runs a month on its own.

No - the timeout comes from your plan and is applied to every job automatically, from 20 seconds on Free up to 600 seconds on Enterprise. If a request is still running when the timeout is reached it gets cancelled and recorded as a failure. Jobs that finish sooner are unaffected. If you need longer, upgrading raises it across all your jobs at once.

Two things. Every job's request timeout drops to the lower plan's value, so any job that normally takes longer than that will start failing. And if you have more active jobs or more scheduled runs than the lower plan allows, the excess is paused automatically - oldest jobs are kept, and the most frequent schedules are paused first. Nothing is ever deleted, and we email you a summary of exactly what changed. If you upgrade again, jobs paused this way are resumed automatically.

Yes. Every run is logged with its HTTP status code, duration, and full response body. You can browse the run history for any job directly from the dashboard and get notified by email on failure or on every run, depending on your plan.

Yes. You can disable any job from the dashboard and re-enable it at any time without losing its URL, schedule, or configuration.

Yes. Whenever your account is signed in to from an IP address it has not used before, we email you a heads-up with the device, IP address and time. If it was you, nothing to do. If not, the email links straight to your Security page where you can change your password and sign out every other session. You can review your active sessions there at any time.

Yes. You can switch plans from the Pricing page at any time. Upgrades take effect immediately. If a downgrade cannot fit your current usage, CronEngine warns you before the change.

You can reach us at support@cronengine.com. We typically respond within one business day.