Python Get Today’s Current Date and Time

Tutorial details Difficulty Easy (rss) Root privileges No Requirements Python v2.x+ Time 2m

datetime

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How to get current date and time in Python?

How do I find out the current date and time in Python? What is the module or function I need to use to get current time or date in Python programming language? How can I get today’s date and current date and time in Python in different formats using strftime() method?You can use time module (low level) which provides various time-related functions. However, this module is always available, not all functions are available on all platforms. Hence, you need to use the(high level Object-oriented interface to dates and times) module in Python. It provides classes for manipulating dates and times in both simple and complex ways. While date and time arithmetic is supported, the focus of the implementation is on efficient attribute extraction for output formatting and manipulation.

The syntax is:

time . strftime ( format ) ## 24 hour format ## time . strftime ( "%H:%M:%S" ) ## 12 hour format ## time . strftime ( "%I:%M:%S" ) time.strftime(format) ## 24 hour format ## time.strftime("%H:%M:%S") ## 12 hour format ## time.strftime("%I:%M:%S")

Here is another example done using datetime module:

#!/usr/bin/python3 from datetime import date today = date. today ( ) fdate = date. today ( ) . strftime ( '%d/%m/%Y' ) print ( "Today's current date is -" , today ) print ( "Date in dd/mm/YYYY format -" , fdate ) #!/usr/bin/python3 from datetime import date today = date.today() fdate = date.today().strftime('%d/%m/%Y') print("Today's current date is -", today) print("Date in dd/mm/YYYY format -", fdate)

Getting current time in python using time module

Let us see some examples of time module:

Examples

A simple program in python to get today’s date and time:

#!/usr/bin/python import time print ( time . strftime ( "%H:%M:%S" ) ) ## 12 hour format ## print ( time . strftime ( "%I:%M:%S" ) ) #!/usr/bin/python import time print (time.strftime("%H:%M:%S")) ## 12 hour format ## print (time.strftime("%I:%M:%S"))

Sample outputs:

23:46:08 11:46:08

To print current date use:

#!/usr/bin/python import time ## dd/mm/yyyy format print ( time . strftime ( "%d/%m/%Y" ) ) #!/usr/bin/python import time ## dd/mm/yyyy format print (time.strftime("%d/%m/%Y"))

Sample outputs:

04/10/2013

Getting locals date and time in Python

#!/usr/bin/python # Purpose: Python Current Date Time Demo # Author: nixCraft # -------------------------------------------- import time now = time . strftime ( "%c" ) ## date and time representation print "Current date & time " + time . strftime ( "%c" ) ## Only date representation print "Current date " + time . strftime ( "%x" ) ## Only time representation print "Current time " + time . strftime ( "%X" ) ## Display current date and time from now variable print ( "Current time %s" % now ) #!/usr/bin/python # Purpose: Python Current Date Time Demo # Author: nixCraft # -------------------------------------------- import time now = time.strftime("%c") ## date and time representation print "Current date & time " + time.strftime("%c") ## Only date representation print "Current date " + time.strftime("%x") ## Only time representation print "Current time " + time.strftime("%X") ## Display current date and time from now variable print ("Current time %s" % now )

Sample outputs:

Current date & time Sat Oct 5 00:04:59 2013 Current date 10/05/13 Current time 00:04:59 Current time Sat Oct 5 00:04:59 2013

Format strings to get the current date and time in Python

The following directives can be embedded in the format string:

Directive Meaning %a Weekday name. %A Full weekday name. %b Abbreviated month name. %B Full month name. %c Appropriate date and time representation. %d Day of the month as a decimal number [01,31]. %H Hour (24-hour clock) as a decimal number [00,23]. %I Hour (12-hour clock) as a decimal number [01,12]. %j Day of the year as a decimal number [001,366]. %m Month as a decimal number [01,12]. %M Minute as a decimal number [00,59]. %p Equivalent of either AM or PM. %S Second as a decimal number [00,61]. %U Week number of the year (Sunday as the first day of the week) as a decimal number [00,53]. All days in a new year preceding the first Sunday are considered to be in week 0. %w Weekday as a decimal number [0(Sunday),6]. %W Week number of the year (Monday as the first day of the week) as a decimal number [00,53]. All days in a new year preceding the first Monday are considered to be in week 0. %x Appropriate date representation. %X Apropriate time representation. %y Year without century as a decimal number [00,99]. %Y Year with century as a decimal number. %Z Time zone name (no characters if no time zone exists). %% A literal ‘%’ character.

Get the current date and time in Python using datetime module

The syntax is:

now = datetime . datetime . now ( ) now. hour now. mintue now. year now. day now. month now = datetime.datetime.now() now.hour now.mintue now.year now.day now.month

Examples

#!/usr/bin/python import datetime i = datetime . datetime . now ( ) print ( "Current date & time = %s" % i ) print ( "Date and time in ISO format = %s" % i. isoformat ( ) ) print ( "Current year = %s" %i. year ) print ( "Current month = %s" %i. month ) print ( "Current date (day) = %s" %i. day ) print ( "dd/mm/yyyy format = %s/%s/%s" % ( i. day , i. month , i. year ) ) print ( "Current hour = %s" %i. hour ) print ( "Current minute = %s" %i. minute ) print ( "Current second = %s" %i. second ) print ( "hh:mm:ss format = %s:%s:%s" % ( i. hour , i. month , i. second ) ) #!/usr/bin/python import datetime i = datetime.datetime.now() print ("Current date & time = %s" % i) print ("Date and time in ISO format = %s" % i.isoformat() ) print ("Current year = %s" %i.year) print ("Current month = %s" %i.month) print ("Current date (day) = %s" %i.day) print ("dd/mm/yyyy format = %s/%s/%s" % (i.day, i.month, i.year) ) print ("Current hour = %s" %i.hour) print ("Current minute = %s" %i.minute) print ("Current second = %s" %i.second) print ("hh:mm:ss format = %s:%s:%s" % (i.hour, i.month, i.second) )

Sample outputs:

Current date & time = 2013-10-05 00:15:31.769049 Date and time in ISO format = 2013-10-05T00:15:31.769049 Current year = 2013 Current month = 10 Current date (day) = 5 dd/mm/yyyy format = 5/10/2013 Current hour = 0 Current minute = 15 Current second = 31 hh:mm:ss format = 0:10:31

I tested above programes with both Python 2 and Python 3:



date.strftime(format)

#!/usr/bin/python from datetime import datetime i = datetime . now ( ) print str ( i ) print i. strftime ( '%Y/%m/%d %H:%M:%S' ) #!/usr/bin/python from datetime import datetime i = datetime.now() print str(i) print i.strftime('%Y/%m/%d %H:%M:%S')

You can useto get a string representing the date, controlled by an explicit format string (see above table):

Sample outputs:

2013-10-05 00:20:30.495228 2013/10/05 00:20:30

Conclusion

You learned how to to get today’s date and current date and time in Python using various methods. See python time and datetime module for more info.