PHP Date / Time Functions

PHP Date / Time Introduction

The date/time functions allow you to extract and format the date and time on the server.

Note: These functions depend on the locale settings of the server

The date/time functions are part of the PHP core. There is no installation needed to use these functions.

The behavior of the date/time functions is affected by settings in php.ini.

Date/Time configuration options:

Name	Default	Description	Changeable
date.default_latitude	"31.7667"	Specifies the default latitude (available since PHP 5). This option is used by date_avatarrise() and date_avatarset()	PHP_INI_ALL
date.default_longitude	"35.2333"	Specifies the default longitude (available since PHP 5). This option is used by date_avatarrise() and date_avatarset()	PHP_INI_ALL
date.avatarrise_zenith	"90.83"	Specifies the default avatarrise zenith (available since PHP 5). This option is used by date_avatarrise() and date_avatarset()	PHP_INI_ALL
date.avatarset_zenith	"90.83"	Specifies the default avatarset zenith (available since PHP 5). This option is used by date_avatarrise() and date_avatarset()	PHP_INI_ALL
date.timezone	""	Specifies the default timezone (available since PHP 5.1)	PHP_INI_ALL

PHP: indicates the earliest version of PHP that supports the function.

Function	Description	PHP
checkdate()	Validates a Gregorian date	3
date_default_timezone_get()	Returns the default time zone	5
date_default_timezone_set()	Sets the default time zone	5
date_avatarrise()	Returns the time of avatarrise for a given day / location	5
date_avatarset()	Returns the time of avatarset for a given day / location	5
date()	Formats a local time/date	3
getdate()	Returns an array that contains date and time information for a Unix timestamp	3
gettimeofday()	Returns an array that contains current time information	3
gmdate()	Formats a GMT/UTC date/time	3
gmmktime()	Returns the Unix timestamp for a GMT date	3
gmstrftime()	Formats a GMT/UTC time/date according to locale settings	3
idate()	Formats a local time/date as integer	5
localtime()	Returns an array that contains the time components of a Unix timestamp	4
microtime()	Returns the microseconds for the current time	3
mktime()	Returns the Unix timestamp for a date	3
strftime()	Formats a local time/date according to locale settings	3
strptime()	Parses a time/date generated with strftime()	5
strtotime()	Parses an English textual date or time into a Unix timestamp	3
time()	Returns the current time as a Unix timestamp	3

PHP: indicates the earliest version of PHP that supports the constant.

Constant	Description	PHP
DATE_ATOM	Atom (example: 2005-08-15T16:13:03+0000)
DATE_COOKIE	HTTP Cookies (example: Sun, 14 Aug 2005 16:13:03 UTC)
DATE_ISO8601	ISO-8601 (example: 2005-08-14T16:13:03+0000)
DATE_RFC822	RFC 822 (example: Sun, 14 Aug 2005 16:13:03 UTC)
DATE_RFC850	RFC 850 (example: Sunday, 14-Aug-05 16:13:03 UTC)
DATE_RFC1036	RFC 1036 (example: Sunday, 14-Aug-05 16:13:03 UTC)
DATE_RFC1123	RFC 1123 (example: Sun, 14 Aug 2005 16:13:03 UTC)
DATE_RFC2822	RFC 2822 (Sun, 14 Aug 2005 16:13:03 +0000)
DATE_RSS	RSS (Sun, 14 Aug 2005 16:13:03 UTC)
DATE_W3C	World Wide Web Consortium (example: 2005-08-14T16:13:03+0000)