Home Assistant Time Pattern: Fix Every Hour vs Every 5 Minutes

Direct answer: If a Home Assistant Time Pattern automation runs once an hour when you expected it to run every few minutes, the most common mistake is entering a number such as 5 instead of an interval such as /5. In a Time Pattern trigger, 5 means the fifth minute of every hour; /5 means every five minutes.

The key difference: 5 versus /5

Home Assistant’s Time Pattern trigger uses a slash to express an interval. That distinction is easy to miss in the visual editor and can produce an automation that appears broken even though the YAML is valid.

Setting	What it means	Example
`5`	A specific minute value	Runs at 00:05, 01:05, 02:05…
`/5`	Every five minutes	Runs at 00:00, 00:05, 00:10…
`10`	A specific minute value	Runs at 00:10, 01:10, 02:10…
`/10`	Every ten minutes	Runs at 00:00, 00:10, 00:20…

The same idea applies to seconds, hours, and days where those Time Pattern fields support a pattern value.

Why the automation looks like it is “only running once an hour”

Suppose you want to check a sensor every five minutes. You open the automation editor and set Minutes to 5. Home Assistant accepts the configuration because it is a valid time pattern, but you have told it to react when the clock reaches five minutes past the hour.

The result is perfectly consistent:

10:05 — runs
11:05 — runs
12:05 — runs
12:10 — does not run
12:15 — does not run

That can look like a failed automation when the real problem is simply the meaning of the value.

How to set “every 5 minutes” correctly

Open Settings → Automations & scenes.
Open the automation that is running at the wrong frequency.
Find its Time pattern trigger.
In the Minutes field, use /5, not 5.
Save the automation.
Watch the trigger activity to confirm that it reacts at the expected times.

Home Assistant’s documentation specifically gives /5 as the pattern for running every five minutes and explains that a value without the slash represents an exact value.

What if you want every 10 or 15 minutes?

Use the same pattern:

/10 = every 10 minutes
/15 = every 15 minutes
/30 = every 30 minutes

For evenly spaced intervals, choose a value that divides the hour cleanly. That makes the schedule predictable and easier to diagnose.

Don’t confuse “every five minutes” with “at minute five”

This is the most important distinction in this troubleshooting problem. A Time Pattern trigger is not asking, “How often should I run?” when you enter a plain number. It is matching a clock value.

Think of it this way:

5 asks: “Is the minute currently 5?”

/5 asks: “Is this one of the five-minute intervals?”

Check the other Time Pattern fields too

If the automation still behaves incorrectly, inspect Hours, Days, and Seconds as well. A correct /5 minute pattern can still be restricted by another field.

For example, if you specify an hour value as well as a minute pattern, the automation is no longer simply “every five minutes all day.” The additional time restriction becomes part of the trigger.

Use traces to prove what happened

Don’t rely only on whether a light or notification changed. Open the automation’s traces or trigger information and confirm when Home Assistant actually reacted.

A trace is especially useful when the automation has several triggers or when the action itself has additional conditions. If the time trigger fires but the action does not happen, you may have moved beyond a trigger-frequency problem and into a condition or action problem.

What if it runs at the right interval but the action still doesn’t happen?

Then the Time Pattern may already be working correctly. Home Assistant evaluates conditions after a trigger fires. If a condition is false at that moment, the automation can stop before its actions execute.

For example, an automation could check a temperature every five minutes but only turn on a fan when the temperature is above a threshold. The trigger can fire correctly at 12:00, 12:05, 12:10 and so on while the fan remains off because the condition is not met.

What if you need to check something continuously?

A Time Pattern trigger is useful when the requirement is genuinely periodic: check every five minutes, every ten minutes, and so forth.

But if what you really want is “do something immediately when the value crosses a threshold,” a state or numeric-state trigger may be a better design. Polling every five minutes can introduce a delay and may miss the exact transition you care about.

Quick diagnostic checklist

Runs once per hour: check for a plain minute value such as 5.
Should run every five minutes: change it to /5.
Still doesn’t perform the action: inspect the trace for conditions that failed.
Trigger never appears: check that the automation is enabled.
Wrong clock time: check Home Assistant’s configured time zone.
Multiple triggers: confirm another trigger is not changing the expected behavior.

Example: a simple five-minute check

If your goal is to periodically evaluate a condition, the important part of the automation is the time-pattern trigger. Conceptually, the schedule is:

minutes: "/5"

The trigger starts the automation at five-minute intervals. The conditions then decide whether the actions should actually run.

When you should use a different trigger

Use a Time Pattern trigger when you intentionally want periodic checks. Use an event, state, numeric-state, device, or other appropriate trigger when the automation should respond to a specific event as it happens.

For example, “turn the light on when motion is detected” normally does not need a five-minute timer. “Check every five minutes whether the humidity is still above my threshold” is a much better fit for a periodic trigger plus a condition.

Frequently asked questions

Why does Home Assistant run my automation at 5 minutes past every hour?

Check the Time Pattern trigger. A minute value of 5 means the fifth minute of each hour. It is different from /5, which means every five minutes.

Does /5 mean exactly five minutes after the automation starts?

No. It follows the clock pattern. It is an interval pattern based on the clock rather than a five-minute countdown that begins when the automation is enabled.

Can I use /10 or /15?

Yes. Those patterns represent ten-minute and fifteen-minute intervals respectively.

Why does the trigger run but my device doesn’t change?

Check the trace for conditions and actions. A trigger can fire correctly while a condition prevents the action or an action fails.

Sources and testing note

This guide was checked against Home Assistant’s current automation documentation on October 8, 2026. It is a documentation-based troubleshooting guide, not a claim of testing on a particular Home Assistant installation.

Home Assistant Time Pattern Runs Every Hour Instead of Every 5 Minutes: Fix 5 vs /5