PHP strftime() Function
The PHP strftime() function formats the time and/or date according to locale settings. Month and weekday names and other language-dependent strings respect the current locale set with setlocale() function.
Syntax
strftime(format, timestamp)
Parameters
format |
Required. Specify the format string to use. Refer to the table below for formatting options. |
timestamp |
Optional. Specify the Unix timestamp. If omitted or null, it defaults to the current local time. |
format parameter string
Format character | Description | Example returned values |
---|---|---|
Day | ||
%a | An abbreviated textual representation of the day | Sun through Sat |
%A | A full textual representation of the day | Sunday through Saturday |
%d | Two-digit day of the month (with leading zeros) | 01 to 31 |
%e | Day of the month, with a space preceding single digits. | 1 to 31 |
%j | Day of the year, 3 digits with leading zeros | 001 to 366 |
%u | ISO-8601 numeric representation of the day of the week | 1 (for Monday) through 7 (for Sunday) |
%w | Numeric representation of the day of the week | 0 (for Sunday) through 6 (for Saturday) |
Week | ||
%U | Week number of the given year, starting with the first Sunday as the first week | 13 (for the 13th full week of the year) |
%V | ISO-8601:1988 week number of the given year, starting with the first week of the year with at least 4 weekdays, with Monday being the start of the week | 01 through 53 (where 53 accounts for an overlapping week) |
%W | A numeric representation of the week of the year, starting with the first Monday as the first week | 46 (for the 46th week of the year beginning with a Monday) |
Month | ||
%b | Abbreviated month name, based on the locale | Jan through Dec |
%B | Full month name, based on the locale | January through December |
%h | Abbreviated month name, based on the locale (an alias of %b) | Jan through Dec |
%m | Two digit representation of the month | 01 (for January) through 12 (for December) |
Year | ||
%C | Two digit representation of the century (year divided by 100, truncated to an integer) | 19 for the 20th Century |
%g | Two digit representation of the year going by ISO-8601:1988 standards (see %V) | 09 for the week of January 6, 2009 |
%G | The full four-digit version of %g | 2008 for the week of January 3, 2009 |
%y | Two digit representation of the year | 09 for 2009, 79 for 1979 |
%Y | Four digit representation for the year | 2038 |
Time | ||
%H | Two digit representation of the hour in 24-hour format | 00 through 23 |
%k | Hour in 24-hour format, with a space preceding single digits | 0 through 23 |
%I | Two digit representation of the hour in 12-hour format | 01 through 12 |
%l | (lower-case 'L') Hour in 12-hour format, with a space preceding single digits | 1 through 12 |
%M | Two digit representation of the minute | 00 through 59 |
%p | UPPER-CASE 'AM' or 'PM' based on the given time | AM for 00:31, PM for 22:23 |
%P | lower-case 'am' or 'pm' based on the given time | am for 00:31, pm for 22:23 |
%r | Same as "%I:%M:%S %p" | 09:34:17 PM for 21:34:17 |
%R | Same as "%H:%M" | 00:35 for 12:35 AM, 16:44 for 4:44 PM |
%S | Two digit representation of the second | 00 through 59 |
%T | Same as "%H:%M:%S" | 21:34:17 for 09:34:17 PM |
%X | Preferred time representation based on locale, without the date | 03:59:16 or 15:59:16 |
%z | The time zone offset. | -0500 for US Eastern Time |
%Z | The time zone abbreviation. | EST for Eastern Time |
Time and Date Stamps | ||
%c | Preferred date and time stamp based on locale | Tue Feb 5 00:45:10 2009 for February 5, 2009 at 12:45:10 AM |
%D | Same as "%m/%d/%y" | 02/05/09 for February 5, 2009 |
%F | Same as "%Y-%m-%d" (commonly used in database datestamps) | 2009-02-05 for February 5, 2009 |
%s | Unix Epoch Time timestamp | 305815200 for September 10, 1979 08:40:00 AM |
%x | Preferred date representation based on locale, without the time | 02/05/09 for February 5, 2009 |
Miscellaneous | ||
%n | A newline character ("\n") | |
%t | A Tab character ("\t") | |
%% | A literal percentage character ("%") |
Return Value
Returns a string formatted according to specified format the given timestamp or the current local time if no timestamp is given. Month and weekday names and other language-dependent strings respect the current locale set with setlocale() function. The function returns false if format is empty, contains unsupported conversion specifiers, or if the length of the returned string would be greater than 4095.
Exceptions
If the time zone is not valid, the function generates a E_WARNING.
Example: strftime() example
The example below shows the usage of strftime() function.
<?php //displaying the date echo strftime("%d %B, %Y", strtotime("10/15/2015 10:15:28"))."\n"; //displaying the time echo strftime("%I:%M:%S %p", strtotime("10/15/2015 10:15:28"))."\n"; //displaying date and time echo strftime("%d %B, %Y %I:%M:%S %p", strtotime("10/15/2015 10:15:28"))."\n"; //displaying date and time (current local time) echo strftime("%d %B, %Y %I:%M:%S %p", time()); ?>
The output of the above code will be:
15 October, 2015 10:15:28 AM 15 October, 2015 10:15:28 AM 01 October, 2021 09:41:03 AM
Example: strftime() locale examples
Consider one more example where this function is used with different locales.
<?php //setting locale to German setlocale(LC_ALL, 'de_DE'); echo strftime("The current German time is %r\n"); //setting locale to UK setlocale(LC_ALL, 'UK'); echo strftime("The current UK time is %r\n"); ?>
The output of the above code will be:
The current German time is 09:43:29 AM The current UK time is 09:43:29 AM
❮ PHP Date and Time Reference