Cron Descriptor

A Python library that converts cron expressions into human readable strings. Ported to Python from https://github.com/bradyholt/cron-expression-descriptor.

Author: Adam Schubert (https://www.salamek.cz)
Original Author & Credit: Brady Holt (http://www.geekytidbits.com)
License: MIT

Features

Supports all cron expression special characters including * / , - ? L W, #
Supports 5, 6 (w/ seconds or year), or 7 (w/ seconds and year) part cron expressions
Provides casing options (Sentence, Title, Lower, etc.)
Localization with support for ~31 languages
Supports Python 3.10 - 3.13

Installation

Using PIP

pip install cron-descriptor

Usage example

Simple

from cron_descriptor import get_description, ExpressionDescriptor

print(get_description("* 2 3 * *"))

#OR

print(str(ExpressionDescriptor("* 2 3 * *")))

Advanced

# Consult Options.py/CasingTypeEnum.py/DescriptionTypeEnum.py for more info
from cron_descriptor import Options, CasingTypeEnum, DescriptionTypeEnum, ExpressionDescriptor

descriptor = ExpressionDescriptor(
    expression = "*/10 * * * *",
    casing_type = CasingTypeEnum.Sentence,
    use_24hour_time_format = True
)

# GetDescription uses DescriptionTypeEnum.FULL by default:
print(descriptor.get_description())
print(f"{descriptor = }")

# Or passing Options class as second argument:

options = Options()
options.casing_type = CasingTypeEnum.Sentence
options.use_24hour_time_format = True
descriptor = ExpressionDescriptor("*/10 * * * *", options)
print(descriptor.get_description(DescriptionTypeEnum.FULL))

Languages Available

Language	Locale Code	Contributor
English	en	Brady Holt
Chinese Simplified	zh_CN	Star Peng
Chinese Traditional	zh_TW	Ricky Chiang
Czech	cs_CZ	Adam Schubert
Danish	da_DK	Rasmus Melchior Jacobsen
Dutch	nl_NL	TotalMace
Finnish	fi_FI	Mikael Rosenberg
French	fr_FR	Arnaud TAMAILLON
German	de_DE	Michael Schuler
Hebrew	he_IL	Ariel Deil
Hungarian	hu_HU	Varga Miklós
Italian	it_IT	rinaldihno
Japanese	ja_JP	Tho Nguyen
Korean	ko_KR	KyuJoo Han
Norwegian	nb_NO	Siarhei Khalipski
Persian	fa_IR	A. Bahrami
Polish	pl_PL	foka
Portuguese	pt_PT	Renato Lima
Portuguese (Brazil)	pt_BR	Renato Lima
Romanian	ro_RO	Illegitimis
Russian	ru_RU	LbISS
Slovenian	sl_SI	Jani Bevk
Spanish	es_ES	Ivan Santos
Spanish (Mexico)	es_MX	Ion Mincu
Swedish	sv_SE	Åke Engelbrektson
Vietnamese	vi_VN	Nguyen Duc Son
Tamil	ta_IN	Sankar Hari
Thai	th_TH	Michael Lyons
Turkish	tr_TR	Mustafa SADEDİL
Ukrainian	uk_UA	Taras
Greek	el_GR	hardra1n
Kazakh	kk_KZ	hardra1n

Original Source

.NET - https://github.com/bradyholt/cron-expression-descriptor

Ports

Java - https://github.com/RedHogs/cron-parser
Ruby - https://github.com/alpinweis/cronex
Golang - https://github.com/jsuar/go-cron-descriptor

Running Unit Tests

python setup.py test

Translating

cron-descriptor is using Gettext for translations.

To create new translation or edit existing one, i suggest using Poedit.

You can copy/rename and translate any file from locale directory:

cp ./cron_descriptor/locale/de_DE.po ./cron_descriptor/locale/YOUR_LOCALE_CODE.po
poedit ./cron_descriptor/locale/YOUR_LOCALE_CODE.po

or you can generate new untranslated *.po file from sources by running in cron_descriptor directory:

cd cron_descriptor
xgettext *.py -o locale/YOUR_LOCALE_CODE.po

Generating *.mo file from *.po file. In root directory run command:

msgfmt -o cron_descriptor/locale/YOUR_LOCALE_CODE.mo cron_descriptor/locale/YOUR_LOCALE_CODE.po

Developing

All suggestions and PR's are welcomed

Just clone this repository and register pre-commit hook by running:

ln -s ../../code-check.sh .git/hooks/pre-commit

Then install dev requirements:

pip install .[dev,test]

Metadata

Release files for cron-descriptor 2.2.1

For a detailed explanation of source distributions (sdists) and built distributions (wheels), please see the package formats documentation.

Source distribution (sdist)

Source distribution for cron-descriptor 2.2.1
File	Size	Uploaded
cron_descriptor-2.2.1.tar.gz	53.6 kB	Oct 13, 2026	Details

Built distribution (wheel)

Table of built distributions (wheels) for cron-descriptor 2.2.1
File	Interpreter	ABI	Platform	Reset
cron_descriptor-2.2.1-py3-none-any.whl 76.6 kB Oct 13, 2026	Python 3	none	any	Details

Total release size: 130.2 kB

Release files / cron_descriptor-2.2.1.tar.gz

Download URL	cron_descriptor-2.2.1.tar.gz
Size	53.6 kB
Tags	Source
SHA-256 checksum How to use checksums	`6759056f43b3cabca274b5df182bb63571f2f383bdd4d9d3ff4662c527430a65`
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Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? What is trusted publishing?	No
Uploaded via	`twine/6.1.0 CPython/3.13.5`

Release files / cron_descriptor-2.2.1-py3-none-any.whl

Download URL	cron_descriptor-2.2.1-py3-none-any.whl
Size	76.6 kB
Tags	Python 3
SHA-256 checksum How to use checksums	`23b42aca983841333aaf28095024e0457f005621d03e658edbd7316a5f2bbd42`
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Upload date	Oct 13, 2026
Uploaded using Trusted Publishing? What is trusted publishing?	No
Uploaded via	`twine/6.1.0 CPython/3.13.5`