How to schedule automatic restarts, backups and commands
Use the panel's Schedules tab to restart your server every night, make backups on a timer or send console commands automatically.
Schedules run actions on your server at set times, even when you're offline. Common uses: a daily restart to keep a Minecraft server fresh, a backup every night, or a "server restarting in 5 minutes" message.
Create a schedule
- Open your server and go to Schedules, then Create schedule.
- Give it a name and set when it runs with the Minute, Hour, Day of month, Month and Day of week boxes. These use cron format:
*means "every". - Leave Schedule enabled on. Turn on Only when server is online if it should skip runs while the server is stopped.
- Save, then open the schedule and add one or more tasks.
Example times
| When | Minute | Hour | Day of month | Month | Day of week |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Every day at 4:00 | 0 | 4 | * | * | * |
| Every 6 hours | 0 | */6 | * | * | * |
| Every Sunday at 3:30 | 30 | 3 | * | * | 0 |
Times follow the panel's clock. Check the schedule's "next run" time after saving to confirm it's what you meant.
Tasks you can add
- Send command: types a command into the console, like
say Restarting in 5 minuteson Minecraft. - Send power action: start, stop, restart or kill the server.
- Create backup: makes a backup, if your server has backup slots (see Backups).
Each task has a time offset in seconds, counted from the task before it. That lets you chain steps.
Recipe: nightly restart with a warning
- Task 1: Send command
say Server restarting in 1 minute, offset 0. - Task 2: Send power action Restart, offset 60.
Tip: for a bot, a daily restart is a simple way to clear memory leaks. It doesn't replace fixing the crash; the Console shows why it stopped.
Still stuck? Use the live chat on the panel or ask in the ESN Hosting Discord. Last updated October 27, 2026.