NOTE: If your script does not generate any output, it is possible that notification emails are not sent either, however, the cron job is working. 

In order to set up a cron job, go to cPanel > section Advanced > Cron Jobs menu: 

General cron job format is as follows: 

[path to environment] [Path to script] [Script parameters] 


For example, if you want to run a PHP script located in the public_html directory, the correct cron command will be: 

/usr/local/bin/php /home/cPaneluser/public_html/yourscript.php 

/usr/bin/php -q /home/cPaneluser/public_html/yourscript.php (for business servers)


or if you want to use a relative path (different commands are divided by “;”): 

cd /home/YourcPuser/public_html/; /usr/local/bin/php yourscript.php

cd /home/YourcPuser/public_html/; /usr/bin/php -q yourscript.php (for business servers)

For Python and Perl scripts, there is no need to use a full path to the environment, the environment interpreter directive will be enough on shared servers. 

python /home/YourcPuser/public_html/yourscript.py

perl /home/YourcPuser/public_html/yourscript.pl


Alternatively, you can just use curl request as the cron job command for the same purpose: 

curl “http://yourdomain.com/script.php?argument1=arg1&argument2=arg2” 
curl “http://yourdomain.com/script.py” 
curl “http://yourdomain.com/script.pl”

However, unlike the first method, curl-based cron jobs will work only if URLs specified in curl requests are resolving, e.g., DNS records for the domain are correct and running.