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PHP Date Format

PHP Date Format

Q: How do I format a date in PHP?

Call date($format) for the current time or date($format, $timestamp) for another moment. For example, date('Y-m-d H:i:s') prints 2026-10-26 14:05:09. With a DateTime object, use $dt->format('Y-m-d'); both use the same format characters.

Q: How do I print a letter that is also a format character?

Escape it with a backslash. date('\T\o\d\a\y \i\s l') prints “Today is Monday”. In double-quoted PHP strings you need two backslashes for sequences like \n and \t, so single quotes are easier.

Q: What is the difference between Y and o?

Y is the calendar year. o is the ISO 8601 week-numbering year, which belongs with W. They differ for a few days around New Year: December 29, 2025 is in ISO week 1 of 2026, so o-W gives 2026-01 while Y-W would give the wrong 2025-01.

Q: Why does date() show the wrong time?

PHP uses the default time zone from date.timezone in php.ini, which is often UTC on servers. Set it in php.ini or call date_default_timezone_set('Europe/Berlin'), or better, create new DateTime('now', new DateTimeZone('Europe/Berlin')) so the zone is explicit.

Q: How do I get milliseconds or microseconds?

date() works with whole-second timestamps, so u and v always print zeros. Use DateTime: (new DateTime())->format('Y-m-d H:i:s.v') prints milliseconds, and u prints microseconds.

Q: How do I convert a date string from one format to another?

Parse it with DateTime::createFromFormat(), then format it: DateTime::createFromFormat('d/m/Y', '26/10/2026')->format('Y-m-d') returns 2026-10-26. strtotime() also works for common English formats, but it guesses, and 01/02/2026 is read as January 2.

Type a PHP date() format string and see the result as you type. Below is every format character with an example.

Format string

date('')

Monday, October 26th, 2026 at 2:05 PM

MomentTime zone

The live preview is a JavaScript port of date(). “Confirm with real PHP” runs the same format through PHP 8.4 in your browser.

PHP date() format characters

Examples use Monday, October 26, 2026, 14:05:09 UTC. Any other character is printed as is; escape letters with a backslash.

Day
d	Day of the month, 2 digits with leading zeros (01 to 31)	26
D	Day of the week, three letters (Mon to Sun)	Mon
j	Day of the month without leading zeros (1 to 31)	26
l	Full day of the week (Sunday to Saturday)	Monday
N	ISO 8601 day of the week, 1 (Monday) to 7 (Sunday)	1
S	English ordinal suffix for the day: st, nd, rd or th. Works well with j	th
w	Day of the week, 0 (Sunday) to 6 (Saturday)	1
z	Day of the year, starting from 0 (0 to 365)	298

Week
W	ISO 8601 week number of the year, weeks start on Monday	44

Month
F	Full month name (January to December)	October
m	Month with leading zeros (01 to 12)	10
M	Month, three letters (Jan to Dec)	Oct
n	Month without leading zeros (1 to 12)	10
t	Number of days in the month (28 to 31)	31

Year
L	Leap year: 1 if it is, 0 otherwise	0
o	ISO 8601 week-numbering year, matches W	2026
X	Expanded year with sign, at least 4 digits (PHP 8.2+)	+2026
x	Expanded year if needed, otherwise like Y (PHP 8.2+)	2026
Y	Full year, at least 4 digits	2026
y	Two-digit year	26

Time
a	Lowercase am or pm	pm
A	Uppercase AM or PM	PM
B	Swatch Internet time (000 to 999)	628
g	12-hour hour without leading zeros (1 to 12)	2
G	24-hour hour without leading zeros (0 to 23)	14
h	12-hour hour with leading zeros (01 to 12)	02
H	24-hour hour with leading zeros (00 to 23)	14
i	Minutes with leading zeros (00 to 59)	05
s	Seconds with leading zeros (00 to 59)	09
u	Microseconds. date() always prints 000000; DateTime::format() prints real values	000000
v	Milliseconds. date() always prints 000	000

Time zone
e	Time zone identifier, e.g. UTC or Europe/Berlin	UTC
I	Daylight saving time: 1 if in effect, 0 otherwise	0
O	Difference to UTC without colon, e.g. +0200	+0000
P	Difference to UTC with colon, e.g. +02:00	+00:00
p	Like P, but Z for +00:00 (PHP 8.0+)	Z
T	Time zone abbreviation, e.g. UTC, EST, CEST	UTC
Z	Offset from UTC in seconds (-43200 to 50400)	0

Full date/time
c	ISO 8601 date, e.g. 2026-10-26T14:05:09+00:00	2026-10-26T14:05:09+00:00
r	RFC 2822 date, e.g. Mon, 26 Oct 2026 14:05:09 +0000	Mon, 26 Oct 2026 14:05:09 +0000
U	Seconds since the Unix epoch (January 1, 1970 UTC)	1793023509

Common PHP date formats

Format	Result	Use
`Y-m-d H:i:s`	2026-10-26 14:05:09	MySQL DATETIME
`Y-m-d`	2026-10-26	ISO date
`c`	2026-10-26T14:05:09+00:00	ISO 8601
`D, d M Y H:i:s \G\M\T`	Mon, 26 Oct 2026 14:05:09 GMT	HTTP header
`l, F jS, Y`	Monday, October 26th, 2026	Long US
`d/m/Y`	26/10/2026	Day first
`m/d/Y`	10/26/2026	Month first
`g:i A`	2:05 PM	12-hour time
`U`	1793023509	Unix timestamp

PHP also has constants for standard formats, so you do not have to remember them: DATE_ATOM (Y-m-d\TH:i:sP, the format JSON APIs and <input type="datetime-local"> expect), DATE_RFC2822 for email headers, DATE_RSS for feeds and DATE_COOKIE for cookies. Use them as date(DATE_ATOM) or $dt->format(DateTimeInterface::ATOM).

date() or DateTime?

date() is fine for quick output of the current time. For anything else, use DateTimeImmutable: it carries its own time zone, does calendar arithmetic correctly with modify('+1 month') and add(new DateInterval('P1D')), supports microseconds, and avoids the year 2038 limit that 32-bit timestamps had. Its format() method uses exactly the characters listed above.

$dt = new DateTimeImmutable('now', new DateTimeZone('America/New_York'));
echo $dt->format('D, M j, Y g:i A T');   // Mon, Oct 26, 2026 10:05 AM EDT
echo $dt->modify('last day of this month')->format('Y-m-d');

Paste these lines into the PHP Sandbox to see them run.

Format characters that trip people up

m and i: m is the month, i is minutes. Y-m-d H:m is a classic bug that prints the month where minutes should be.
h and H: lowercase is the 12-hour clock, so pair it with A. Uppercase is 24-hour.
D and d: uppercase is the weekday name, lowercase is the day number.
S: only makes sense right after j, as in jS for “26th”.
W with Y: use o instead of Y next to the ISO week number.
Localised names: date() always prints English names. For other languages, use IntlDateFormatter from the intl extension.

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Frequently asked questions

How do I format a date in PHP?

Call date($format) for the current time or date($format, $timestamp) for another moment. For example, date('Y-m-d H:i:s') prints 2026-10-26 14:05:09. With a DateTime object, use $dt->format('Y-m-d'); both use the same format characters.

How do I print a letter that is also a format character?

Escape it with a backslash. date('\T\o\d\a\y \i\s l') prints “Today is Monday”. In double-quoted PHP strings you need two backslashes for sequences like \n and \t, so single quotes are easier.

What is the difference between Y and o?

Y is the calendar year. o is the ISO 8601 week-numbering year, which belongs with W. They differ for a few days around New Year: December 29, 2025 is in ISO week 1 of 2026, so o-W gives 2026-01 while Y-W would give the wrong 2025-01.

Why does date() show the wrong time?

PHP uses the default time zone from date.timezone in php.ini, which is often UTC on servers. Set it in php.ini or call date_default_timezone_set('Europe/Berlin'), or better, create new DateTime('now', new DateTimeZone('Europe/Berlin')) so the zone is explicit.

How do I get milliseconds or microseconds?

date() works with whole-second timestamps, so u and v always print zeros. Use DateTime: (new DateTime())->format('Y-m-d H:i:s.v') prints milliseconds, and u prints microseconds.

How do I convert a date string from one format to another?

Parse it with DateTime::createFromFormat(), then format it: DateTime::createFromFormat('d/m/Y', '26/10/2026')->format('Y-m-d') returns 2026-10-26. strtotime() also works for common English formats, but it guesses, and 01/02/2026 is read as January 2.