Scheduled tasks do not start automatically on Plesk for Linux server

Alexander Davydov

Updated January 13, 2026 19:02

Plesk for Linux kb: technical

Applicable to:

Plesk for Linux

Symptoms

On a Plesk for Linux server, scheduled tasks do not start automatically, including scheduled backup, statistics tasks or SSL certificate renewal.
If a scheduled task is started manually from Plesk, it works correctly.

Cause

cron service is stopped on the server:

# systemctl status cron.service | grep "Active:"
Active: inactive (dead) since Thu 2019-10-17 13:17:27 +07; 1s ago

RnD is interested in finding why cron isn't running on servers like this. Have a look during the investigation. If found something interesting ask TL to pass it to SEgorov

Resolution

Connect to the server using SSH.
Enable and start cron:
- On CentOS/RHEL/CloudLinux:
  
  # systemctl enable crond
  # systemctl start crond
- On Debian and Ubuntu:
  
  # systemctl enable cron
  # systemctl start cron