PHP date() Function

In this chapter you will learn:

Definition for PHP date() Function
Syntax for PHP date() Function
Parameter for PHP date() Function
Return value for PHP date() Function
Example - prints out the current time in 24-hour clock format
Example - This next example outputs the date in the format of 31st of August 2012

Definition

date function converts timestamps into different types of strings.

Syntax

PHP date() Function has the following format.

date(format,timestamp);

Parameter

Parameter	Is Required	Description
format	Required.	Format of the outputted date string.
timestamp	Optional.	Integer Unix timestamp. Default is the current local time (time())

The complete list of date format characters used in date() is shown in the following table. They are case-sensitive!

Format character	Description	Example
a	Lowercase am/pm	am or pm
A	Uppercase am/pm	AM or PM
B	Swatch Internet Time	000 to 999
c	ISO 8601 date, time, and time zone	2004-06-18T09:26:55+01:00
d	2-digit day of month, leading zeros	01 to 31
D	Day string, three letters	Mon, Thu, Sat
F	Month string, full	January, August
g	12-hour clock hour, no leading zeros	1 to 12
G	24-hour clock hour, no leading zeros	0 to 23
h	12-hour clock hour, leading zeros	01 to 12
H	24-hour clock hour, leading zeros	00 to 23
i	Minutes with leading zeros	00 to 59
I	Is daylight savings time active?	1 if yes, 0 if no
j	Day of month, no leading zeros	1 to 31
l	Day string, full	Monday, Saturday
L	Is it a leap year?	1 if yes, 0 if no
m	Numeric month, leading zeros	01 to 12
M	Short month string	Jan, Aug
n	Numeric month, no leading zeros	1 to 12
O	Difference from GMT	200
r	RFC-822 formatted date	Sat, 22 Dec 1979 17:30 +0000
s	Seconds, with leading zeros	00 to 59
S	English ordinal suffix for day number	st, nd, rd, or th
t	Number of days in month	28 to 31
T	Time zone for server	GMT, CET, EST
U	Unix Timestamp	1056150334
w	Numeric day of week	0 (Sunday), 6 (Saturday)
W	ISO-8601 week number of year	30 (30th week of the year)
y	Two-digit representation of year	97, 02
Y	Four-digit representation of year	1997, 2002
z	Day of year	0 to 366
Z	Time zone offset in seconds	-43200 to 43200
DATE_ATOM	Atom	2013-04-12T15:52:01+00:00
DATE_COOKIE	HTTP Cookies	Friday, 12-Apr-13 15:52:01 UTC
DATE_ISO8601	ISO-8601	2013-04-12T15:52:01+0000
DATE_RFC822	RFC 822	Fri, 12 Apr 13 15:52:01 +0000
DATE_RFC850	RFC 850	Friday, 12-Apr-13 15:52:01 UTC
DATE_RFC1036	RFC 1036	Fri, 12 Apr 13 15:52:01 +0000
DATE_RFC1123	RFC 1123	Fri, 12 Apr 2013 15:52:01 +0000
DATE_RFC2822	RFC 2822	Fri, 12 Apr 2013 15:52:01 +0000
DATE_RFC3339	Same as DATE_ATOM (since PHP 5.1.3)	2013-04-12T15:52:01+00:00
DATE_RSS	RSS	Fri, 12 Aug 2013 15:52:01 +0000
DATE_W3C	World Wide Web Consortium	2013-04-12T15:52:01+00:00

Return

PHP date() Function returns a formatted date string on success. FALSE on failure + an E_WARNING.

Example 1

The following code prints out the current time in 24-hour clock format:


<?PHP//from j  a  va 2  s.  c  o m
print date("H:i"); 
print "The day yesterday was " . date("l", time() - 86400); 
echo "\n";

$hour = date( "G" ); 
$year = date( "Y" ); 

echo $hour; 
echo "\n";
echo $year; 

// Prints the day
echo date("l") . "<br>";

// Prints the day, date, month, year, time, AM or PM
echo date("l jS \of F Y h:i:s A");

?>