> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.asteragents.com/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Schedule Task Tool

> Let agents create scheduled tasks during conversations to automate recurring work

## What it does

The Schedule Task tool lets agents create recurring tasks on behalf of users during a conversation. Instead of manually going to Control Hub to set up a scheduled task, users can just ask the agent — "send me a daily report at 9 AM" — and the agent handles the setup.

The created task runs on the current agent, sending the specified prompt on the configured schedule.

## Key features

* **Natural language scheduling**: Users can say "every morning" or "weekly on Mondays" and the agent converts it to a cron schedule
* **Full cron support**: Accepts standard 5-part cron expressions for precise scheduling
* **Timezone aware**: Automatically converts from the user's timezone to UTC for execution
* **Immediate activation**: Tasks start running on the next scheduled time after creation

## Parameters

| Parameter     | Type   | Required | Description                                                                                       |
| ------------- | ------ | -------- | ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
| `name`        | string | Yes      | A descriptive name for the task                                                                   |
| `description` | string | No       | Optional details about what the task does                                                         |
| `prompt`      | string | Yes      | The complete message sent to the agent on each run. Must be self-contained with all instructions. |
| `schedule`    | string | Yes      | Cron expression (e.g., `0 9 * * *`) or preset (e.g., `daily`, `weekly`)                           |

## Common use cases

### Daily digest emails

*"Send me a daily summary of new candidates in the knowledge base every evening at 6 PM"*

The agent creates a task that runs daily, searches the KB, and emails results.

### Recurring reports

*"Every Monday morning, pull last week's sales data and email a summary to the team"*

The agent sets up a weekly task that queries databases and generates reports.

### Monitoring and alerts

*"Check for urgent support tickets every hour and notify the on-call team"*

The agent creates a frequent check that triggers alerts only when needed.

## Best practices

* **Prompts must be self-contained**: The agent only receives the prompt text on each run — no conversation history from when the task was created
* **Be specific in prompts**: Include all context, recipients, formats, and conditions directly in the prompt
* **Include "no data" handling**: Tell the agent what to do when there's nothing to report (e.g., "If no new items, send a brief confirmation email")

## Managing created tasks

Tasks created by this tool appear in **Control Hub** → **Scheduled Tasks** where you can:

* Edit the schedule or prompt
* Enable/disable the task
* View execution history
* Run the task on demand
* Delete the task

See [Scheduled Tasks](/features/scheduled-tasks) for full management details.

## Related tools

* [Send Email](/tools/send_email) - Often used together — scheduled tasks generate reports and email them
* [Search Knowledge Base](/tools/search_knowledge_base) - Common in scheduled tasks that monitor for new documents
* [Call Agent](/tools/call_agent) - Scheduled tasks can trigger multi-agent workflows