GitHub Actions Cron Uses UTC Time | Generated by AI
GitHub Actions scheduled workflows (using the on: schedule: trigger with cron syntax) always interpret the cron times in UTC (Coordinated Universal Time).
There is no built-in support for specifying a different timezone directly in the workflow YAML. If you want a job to run at a specific local time (e.g., 9:00 AM PST), you must convert that to the equivalent UTC time and write the cron expression accordingly.
Key points from official documentation
- Scheduled workflows use POSIX cron syntax and run at specific UTC times.
- Example:
cron: '0 5 * * *'runs daily at 5:00 AM UTC (not your local time).
This has been consistent for years and remains the case as of late 2025 — no native timezone parameter exists for the schedule event (unlike some other GitHub features like Dependabot).
Events that trigger workflows - GitHub Docs Workflow syntax for GitHub Actions - GitHub Docs