Question 1

What is a Magento 2 cron job?

Accepted Answer

A Magento 2 cron job is a scheduled background task declared in a module's etc/crontab.xml. Magento's cron daemon scans every installed module's crontab.xml on each tick, computes which jobs are due based on their cron expression, and dispatches the configured handler class. Jobs are split into named groups (default, index, consumers, etc.) so each group can run on its own schedule via bin/magento cron:run --group=<name>.

Question 2

How many cron jobs does Magento 2 ship by default?

Accepted Answer

Magento 2 core (currently 2.4.9) declares 66 cron jobs across 32 modules and 8 groups. The default group has 50 jobs, the index group has 3, and the consumers group has 1 — the rest are split across Adobe Payment Services groups. Browse the full list above.

Question 3

How do I list all cron jobs in Magento 2?

Accepted Answer

Three ways. (1) Browse this catalog — every job declared by core is listed above with its schedule and handler class. (2) From the database, run SELECT job_code FROM cron_schedule GROUP BY job_code; — this shows every job that has actually been scheduled at least once. (3) From the CLI, scan etc/crontab.xml across vendor/ and app/code/ — that's the source of truth for what's *declared* (vs. what has run).

Question 4

What's the difference between Magento cron groups (default, index, consumers)?

Accepted Answer

Cron groups let you run different sets of jobs on different schedules. The default group is the catch-all where most jobs live. The index group runs reindex jobs and is often configured to fire more frequently. The consumers group runs message-queue consumers (long-lived workers, not periodic jobs). Adobe Payment Services adds payment_services_data_export and payment_services_order_sync groups that isolate billing workflows. You run a specific group with bin/magento cron:run --group=<name>.

Question 5

How do I run a specific Magento 2 cron job manually?

Accepted Answer

Magento doesn't have a per-job CLI invocation — the smallest unit is a group. Run php bin/magento cron:run --group=<group> --bootstrap=standaloneProcessStarted=1 to execute every job in that group whose schedule is due. To force a job that isn't yet due, set its schedule to */1 * * * * temporarily (or insert a row into cron_schedule with status='pending'), then re-run the cron command. Each per-job page in this catalog shows the exact command for that job's group.

Question 6

What's a config_path in crontab.xml?

Accepted Answer

is an alternative to . Instead of hard-coding the cron expression in the XML, the merchant configures it in the Magento admin (System > Configuration) and Magento reads the value from the supplied admin-config path on each tick. This is how customer-tunable schedules work — for example, the product_alert job uses crontab/default/jobs/catalog_product_alert/schedule/cron_expr so the merchant can change alert frequency without a code deploy.

Magento 2 Cron Jobs Catalog

Browse cron jobs by Magento module

About Magento 2 cron jobs

What is a Magento 2 cron job?

How do I list every cron job in Magento 2?

What's the difference between cron groups?

How do I run a Magento 2 cron job manually?

What's a config_path in crontab.xml?

Related Magento 2 references

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