Viewing Next Occurrences

Before committing to a schedule, it is important to confirm that your configuration will fire at the times you expect. The Workflow Scheduler provides a next-occurrences preview that shows upcoming execution times based on your schedule settings.

Preview in the Creation and Edit Forms

When you configure a Simple or Cron schedule in the workflow creation or edit form, the form displays the next 5 scheduled execution times below the schedule input. The preview updates automatically as you adjust the interval or cron expression — there is no need to save first.

Schedule form showing a cron expression field and five upcoming execution times listed below it

This is the primary tool for catching schedule mistakes before they become a problem. Common issues the preview helps you catch:

  • A cron expression that runs every minute instead of every hour because of a misplaced asterisk.
  • A schedule intended to run on weekdays that is actually configured for weekends due to a day-of-week range error.
  • A monthly schedule that only fires on day 31 (which several months do not have), resulting in missed runs.
  • A simple interval of 1 day that calculates the first run further in the future than expected based on the creation time.

Next Run Time on the Workflow List

After a workflow is saved, its card in the scheduler list displays the Next Run time — the single next scheduled execution. This gives you a quick overview of what is coming up across all your workflows.

Workflow list showing workflow cards each with their name, schedule description, and next run timestamp

The Next Run time is recalculated after each execution completes, so the list always reflects the upcoming run based on the current time.

Workflow Detail View

Opening a workflow's detail page shows a more complete schedule summary, including:

  • The schedule type and configuration (the cron expression or interval value).
  • The next run time.
  • The last run time and its outcome.

From the detail page you can also use the Run Now button to trigger an immediate execution outside the schedule.

On-Demand Workflows

Workflows configured with the On-Demand schedule type do not show upcoming occurrences because they have no automatic trigger. The Next Run field on the workflow card shows "On demand" instead of a timestamp. These workflows only run when manually triggered.

If a workflow is in Paused state, the Next Run field shows the time the next run would fire if the workflow were active. Resuming the workflow before that time means the run will still execute at the scheduled time. If the scheduled time has already passed while paused, the next run will be calculated from the current time forward based on the schedule interval.

Tips for Verifying Complex Cron Schedules

  • Use the next 5 occurrences preview in the form to verify the pattern is right before saving.
  • For cron expressions you are uncertain about, cross-check with an external tool like crontab.guru to get a plain-English description of the schedule.
  • After saving, check the workflow list to confirm the Next Run time is what you expected.
  • After the first scheduled run completes, review Execution History to confirm it fired at the correct time.