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Through the Olostep /v1/schedules endpoint you can schedule API calls to execute automatically at specified times. Schedule one-time executions or recurring tasks using cron expressions or natural language.
  • Schedule one-time executions at a specific datetime
  • Create recurring schedules using cron expressions
  • Use natural language text to automatically generate cron expressions
  • Schedule HTTP endpoints (GET or POST)
  • For POST requests, use short-form Olostep endpoints (automatically prefixed) or full URLs
  • Pass any payload you want - the payload is sent exactly as you specify it
  • Automatically manage schedule lifecycle
For API details see the Schedule Endpoint API Reference.

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Installation

# pip install requests

import requests

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Create a schedule

Create a schedule to execute API calls automatically. You can create one-time schedules or recurring schedules using cron expressions. The endpoint can be any URL (not limited to Olostep endpoints), and the payload can contain any data you want to send.

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One-time schedule

Schedule an API call to execute once at a specific datetime. 
import requests
import json
from datetime import datetime, timedelta

API_KEY = "<YOUR_API_KEY>"
API_URL = "https://api.olostep.com/v1"

# Schedule a scrape to run in 1 hour
execute_at = (datetime.now() + timedelta(hours=1)).isoformat()

payload = {
    "method": "POST",
    "endpoint": "v1/scrapes",
    "payload": {
        "url_to_scrape": "https://example.com",
        "formats": ["markdown"]
    },
    "execute_at": execute_at,
    "expression_timezone": "UTC"
}

headers = {
    "Authorization": f"Bearer {API_KEY}",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}

response = requests.post(f"{API_URL}/schedules", headers=headers, json=payload)
print(json.dumps(response.json(), indent=2))

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Recurring schedule with cron expression

Create a recurring schedule using a cron expression. Cron expressions use 6 fields format: minute hour day month day-of-week year. 
import requests
import json

API_KEY = "<YOUR_API_KEY>"
API_URL = "https://api.olostep.com/v1"

# Schedule a scrape to run every day at 10am UTC
payload = {
    "method": "POST",
    "endpoint": "v1/scrapes",
    "payload": {
        "url_to_scrape": "https://example.com",
        "formats": ["markdown"]
    },
    "cron_expression": "0 10 * * ? *",
    "expression_timezone": "UTC"
}

headers = {
    "Authorization": f"Bearer {API_KEY}",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}

response = requests.post(f"{API_URL}/schedules", headers=headers, json=payload)
print(json.dumps(response.json(), indent=2))

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Natural language scheduling

Use natural language text to automatically generate cron expressions. The system will convert your text into a valid cron expression. 
import requests
import json

API_KEY = "<YOUR_API_KEY>"
API_URL = "https://api.olostep.com/v1"

# Schedule using natural language
payload = {
    "method": "POST",
    "endpoint": "v1/scrapes",
    "payload": {
        "url_to_scrape": "https://example.com",
        "formats": ["markdown"]
    },
    "text": "every 3 minutes",
    "expression_timezone": "UTC"
}

headers = {
    "Authorization": f"Bearer {API_KEY}",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}

response = requests.post(f"{API_URL}/schedules", headers=headers, json=payload)
print(json.dumps(response.json(), indent=2))

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Response format

When you create a schedule, you’ll receive a schedule object with the following properties: 
{
  "id": "schedule_abc123xyz",
  "object": "schedule"
  "type": "recurring",
  "method": "POST",
  "endpoint": "v1/scrapes",
  "cron_expression": "0 10 * * ? *",
  "expression_timezone": "UTC",
  "created": "2025-01-15T10:00:00.000Z"
}
For one-time schedules, the response includes execute_at instead of cron_expression: 
{
  "id": "schedule_abc123xyz",
  "object": "schedule"
  "type": "onetime",
  "method": "POST",
  "endpoint": "v1/scrapes",
  "execute_at": "2025-01-15T10:00:00.000Z",
  "expression_timezone": "UTC",
  "created": "2025-01-15T09:00:00.000Z"
}

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List schedules

Retrieve all schedules for your team. By default, deleted schedules are filtered out. Use the include_deleted query parameter to include them. 
import requests
import json

API_KEY = "<YOUR_API_KEY>"
API_URL = "https://api.olostep.com/v1"

headers = {
    "Authorization": f"Bearer {API_KEY}"
}

response = requests.get(f"{API_URL}/schedules", headers=headers)
result = response.json()
print(f"Total schedules: {result['count']}")
for schedule in result['schedules']:
    print(json.dumps(schedule, indent=2))

# To include deleted schedules:
# response = requests.get(f"{API_URL}/schedules?include_deleted=true", headers=headers)

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Get a schedule

Retrieve a single schedule by its ID. 
import requests
import json

API_KEY = "<YOUR_API_KEY>"
API_URL = "https://api.olostep.com/v1"
schedule_id = "schedule_abc123xyz"

headers = {
    "Authorization": f"Bearer {API_KEY}"
}

response = requests.get(f"{API_URL}/schedules/{schedule_id}", headers=headers)
print(json.dumps(response.json(), indent=2))

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Delete a schedule

Delete a schedule by its ID. This will stop any future executions. 
import requests
import json

API_KEY = "<YOUR_API_KEY>"
API_URL = "https://api.olostep.com/v1"
schedule_id = "schedule_abc123xyz"

headers = {
    "Authorization": f"Bearer {API_KEY}"
}

response = requests.delete(f"{API_URL}/schedules/{schedule_id}", headers=headers)
print(json.dumps(response.json(), indent=2))

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Supported endpoints

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Olostep endpoints (short form)

For POST requests, you can use short forms for Olostep endpoints. The system will automatically prepend https://api.olostep.com/ for these:
  • v1/scrapes - Schedule web scraping tasks
  • v1/batches - Schedule batch processing jobs
  • v1/crawls - Schedule website crawling operations
  • v1/maps - Schedule map data extraction
  • v1/answers - Schedule answer generation

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Full URLs

You can also provide full URLs for your endpoints. This is required for external APIs or webhooks: 
import requests
import json
from datetime import datetime, timedelta

API_KEY = "<YOUR_API_KEY>"
API_URL = "https://api.olostep.com/v1"

# Schedule a call to an external API
payload = {
    "method": "POST",
    "endpoint": "https://api.example.com/webhook",
    "payload": {
        "custom_field": "any value",
        "data": {"nested": "structure"},
        "timestamp": datetime.now().isoformat()
    },
    "execute_at": (datetime.now() + timedelta(hours=1)).isoformat(),
    "expression_timezone": "UTC"
}

headers = {
    "Authorization": f"Bearer {API_KEY}",
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
}

response = requests.post(f"{API_URL}/schedules", headers=headers, json=payload)
print(json.dumps(response.json(), indent=2))
The payload field accepts any JSON object - you can structure it however you need for your target endpoint.

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Cron expression format

Cron expressions use 6 fields format: 
minute hour day month day-of-week year
Examples:
  • 0/3 * * * ? * - Every 3 minutes
  • 0 10 * * ? * - Every day at 10:00 AM
  • 0 9 ? * MON * - Every Monday at 9:00 AM
  • 0 0 1 * ? * - First day of every month at midnight
Use ? for day-of-month or day-of-week when not specified.

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Natural language examples

You can use natural language to describe schedules. The system will automatically convert them to cron expressions:
  • “every 3 minutes” → 0/3 * * * ? *
  • “every day at 10am” → 0 10 * * ? *
  • “every Monday at 9am” → 0 9 ? * MON *
  • “every hour” → 0 * * * ? *
  • “every week on Monday” → 0 0 ? * MON *

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Important notes

  • One-time schedules are automatically deleted after execution
  • Recurring schedules continue until manually deleted
  • Timezone must be a valid IANA timezone identifier (e.g., “UTC”, “America/New_York”, “Europe/London”)
  • The execute_at datetime must be in the future
  • Natural language conversion may require retries; the system will attempt up to 3 times
  • When using natural language text (text parameter), the timezone defaults to “UTC”
  • Schedules execute the API call with the provided payload exactly as specified - you can pass any JSON structure you need
  • For POST requests, short-form Olostep endpoints (v1/scrapes, v1/batches, v1/crawls, v1/maps, v1/answers) are automatically prefixed with https://api.olostep.com/
  • For other endpoints, provide the full URL
  • The payload can contain any data structure - it’s sent as-is to your target endpoint
  • Deleting an already deleted schedule will return a 400 error

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Pricing

Schedules themselves are free. You only pay for the API calls that are executed when the schedule runs. For example, if you schedule a scrape, you’ll be charged 1 credit per execution (or more if using parsers or LLM extraction).