$ man trigger-dev

Trigger.dev

Background job orchestration platform. Runs long-running tasks, scheduled jobs, and event-driven workflows with built-in retries, logging, and observability.

by Shawn Tenam

Cron jobs are fire-and-forget. If a cron fails at 2 AM, you find out when you check logs the next morning. Trigger.dev adds the reliability layer: automatic retries, failure alerts, execution logs, and the ability to chain jobs into workflows. For GTM automation, this means your enrichment pipeline does not silently fail. If Apollo rate-limits you on lead 47 of 200, Trigger.dev retries that specific lead instead of dropping the whole batch. It goes beyond cron by supporting event-driven triggers - a new lead in Attio fires an enrichment job, not a schedule.

Define jobs in TypeScript. Deploy to Trigger.dev cloud or self-host. Jobs can run on schedules (like cron) or fire on events (webhook, database change, another job completing). The dashboard shows every execution with timing, logs, and retry history. Pair it with Railway for the compute and Trigger.dev for the orchestration.