How to get the current time in Python

Question

What is the module/method used to get the current time?

Answer 1

Similar to Harley's answer, but use the str() function for a quick-n-dirty, slightly more human readable format:

>>> from datetime import datetime
>>> str(datetime.now())
'2011-05-03 17:45:35.177000'

Answer 2

You can use the time module:

import time
print time.strftime("%d/%m/%Y")

>>> 06/02/2015

The use of the capital Y gives the full year, and using y would give 06/02/15.

You could also use the following code to give a more lengthy time:

time.strftime("%a, %d %b %Y %H:%M:%S")
>>> 'Fri, 06 Feb 2015 17:45:09'

Answer 3

The quickest way is:

>>> import time
>>> time.strftime("%Y%m%d")
'20130924'

Answer 4

If you just want the current timestamp in ms (for example, to measure execution time), you can also use the "timeit" module:

import timeit
start_time = timeit.default_timer()
do_stuff_you_want_to_measure()
end_time = timeit.default_timer()
print("Elapsed time: {}".format(end_time - start_time))

Answer 5

The previous answers are all good suggestions, but I find it easiest to use ctime():

In [2]: from time import ctime
In [3]: ctime()
Out[3]: 'Thu Oct 31 11:40:53 2013'

This gives a nicely formatted string representation of the current local time.

Answer 6

if you are using numpy already then directly you can use numpy.datetime64() function.

import numpy as np
str(np.datetime64('now'))

for only date:

str(np.datetime64('today'))

or, if you are using pandas already then you can use pandas.to_datetime() function

import pandas as pd
str(pd.to_datetime('now'))

or,

str(pd.to_datetime('today'))