Schedule a Task using Python

The ‘schedule‘ library can be used to schedule a task in Python.

The command to install the ‘schedule‘ library is:

pip install schedule

(1) To schedule a task in Python to run every day (for example, at 10:00 am every day):

import schedule
import time


def daily_task():
    print("This task runs every day")


# Schedule the task to run every day at ten am
schedule.every().day.at("10:00").do(daily_task)

# Run the scheduler continuously
while True:
    schedule.run_pending()
    time.sleep(1)

In the example above, the ‘schedule‘ library is used to create a task (daily_task) that prints a message every day at 10:00 am (to schedule a task to run at 10 pm, use the format of “22:00“). You can modify the scheduling as needed by changing the intervals and tasks.

(2) To schedule a task to run every hour:

import schedule
import time


def hourly_task():
    print("This task runs every hour")


# Schedule the task to run every hour 
schedule.every().hour.do(hourly_task)

# Run the scheduler continuously
while True:
    schedule.run_pending()
    time.sleep(1)

(3) To schedule a task to run every x minutes (for example, every 30 minutes):

import schedule
import time


def minutes_task():
    print("This task runs every 30 minutes")


# Schedule the task to run every thirty minutes 
schedule.every(30).minutes.do(minutes_task)

# Run the scheduler continuously
while True:
    schedule.run_pending()
    time.sleep(1)

(4) To schedule a task to run every x seconds (for example, every 3 seconds):

import schedule
import time


def seconds_task():
    print("This task runs every 3 seconds")


# Schedule the task to run every three seconds
schedule.every(3).seconds.do(seconds_task)

# Run the scheduler continuously
while True:
    schedule.run_pending()
    time.sleep(1)

Few notes to consider:

The time.sleep(1) line is included to prevent the script from consuming excessive CPU resources
The above scripts will not stop by themselves. They are designed to run indefinitely
To stop the script manually, you would need to interrupt the execution

If you want to add a condition to stop the script after a certain number of iterations or after a specific time, you can modify the script accordingly.

For example, to include a counter that stops the script after 5 iterations:

import schedule
import time


def seconds_task():
    print("This task runs every 3 seconds")


# Schedule the task to run every three seconds
schedule.every(3).seconds.do(seconds_task)

# Variable to count iterations
iterations = 0
max_iterations = 5

# Run the scheduler for five iterations
while iterations <= max_iterations:
    schedule.run_pending()
    time.sleep(3)
    iterations += 1

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