# Schedule reboots and power windows

> Reboot a server every day or every week at an hour you choose, and stop it during the hours you don't need it, in your own time zone.

Source: https://vpsnine.com/help/schedule-reboots-and-power-windows · Updated: 2026-10-21

A power schedule reboots your server on a schedule, and can stop it during hours you don't use it (a development box at night, a test server over the weekend) and start it again afterwards. Times are in the time zone you pick, so a reboot at 04:00 stays at 04:00 across daylight saving changes.

## Set a schedule

Open the server and go to **Power**. Set either part, or both, then **turn on**:

- **Reboot**: every day, or every week on a day you pick, at an hour.
- **Off hours**: stop the server at one hour and start it again at another, on the days you tick. When the start hour is earlier than the stop hour (20:00 to 08:00, say), the server starts again the next morning.
- **Time zone**: where those hours are.

[Screenshot: The Power tab with a weekly reboot and off hours on weekday nights] A weekly reboot on Sunday at 04:00, and the server off from 20:00 to 08:00 on weekday nights.

The tab shows when each action runs next and how the last one went. The Settings tab shows the schedule in a line too.

From the command line or the API:

```bash
vps9 schedules set staging --tz Europe/Amsterdam --reboot weekly --weekday sun --hour 4
vps9 schedules set staging --off-hours 20-08 --days weekdays
vps9 schedules show staging
vps9 schedules off staging
```

The API has `GET`, `PUT` and `DELETE /servers/:id/power-schedule`; see the [API reference](https://vpsnine.com/help/api-quickstart).

## How it runs

- Each action starts within 5 minutes after its hour. Servers on the same host are spread over those minutes, so they don't all restart at once.
- The **stop** is a clean shutdown, like **Stop** in the panel: the system gets a minute to shut down before it is switched off.
- At the end of the off hours the server is started again **only if the schedule stopped it**. If you stop it yourself during the day, it stays off.
- A **reboot** runs only while the server is running; at night, inside its off hours, it is skipped.
- A suspended server, one in [rescue mode](https://vpsnine.com/help/rescue-mode), or one still busy with another action 30 minutes after the time is skipped until the next time.

If a scheduled action fails, you get a [notification](https://vpsnine.com/help/notifications-and-alerts) (and an email, by your notification settings). The schedule stays on and tries again at its next time.

## Billing

A stopped server is still billed: its disk, its addresses and its room on the host are kept for it while it is off. Off hours save power and keep a test box quiet, not money. To stop paying for a server, [cancel it](https://vpsnine.com/help/cancel-a-server).