How do I get the current date and time in PHP?

Question

Which PHP function can return the current date/time?

Answer 1

Set your time zone:

date_default_timezone_set('Asia/Calcutta');

Then call the date functions

$date = date('Y-m-d H:i:s');

Answer 2

Reference: Here's a link

This can be more reliable than simply adding or subtracting the number of seconds in a day or a month to a timestamp because of daylight saving time.

The PHP code

// Assuming today is March 10th, 2001, 5:16:18 pm, and that we are in the
// Mountain Standard Time (MST) Time Zone

$today = date("F j, Y, g:i a");                 // March 10, 2001, 5:16 pm
$today = date("m.d.y");                         // 03.10.01
$today = date("j, n, Y");                       // 10, 3, 2001
$today = date("Ymd");                           // 20010310
$today = date('h-i-s, j-m-y, it is w Day');     // 05-16-18, 10-03-01, 1631 1618 6 Satpm01
$today = date('\i\t \i\s \t\h\e jS \d\a\y.');   // it is the 10th day.
$today = date("D M j G:i:s T Y");               // Sat Mar 10 17:16:18 MST 2001
$today = date('H:m:s \m \i\s\ \m\o\n\t\h');     // 17:03:18 m is month
$today = date("H:i:s");                         // 17:16:18
$today = date("Y-m-d H:i:s");                   // 2001-03-10 17:16:18 (the MySQL DATETIME format)

Answer 3

Since PHP 5.2.0 you can use the DateTime() class:

use \Datetime;

$now = new DateTime();
echo $now->format('Y-m-d H:i:s');    // MySQL datetime format
echo $now->getTimestamp();           // Unix Timestamp -- Since PHP 5.3

And to specify the timezone:

$now = new DateTime(null, new DateTimeZone('America/New_York'));
$now->setTimezone(new DateTimeZone('Europe/London'));    // Another way
echo $now->getTimezone();

Answer 4

PHP's date function can do this job.

date()

Description:

string date(string $format [, int $timestamp = time()])

Returns a string formatted according to the given format string using the given integer timestamp or the current time if no timestamp is given.

Examples:

$today = date("F j, Y, g:i a");               // March 10, 2001, 5:16 pm
$today = date("m.d.y");                       // 03.10.01
$today = date("j, n, Y");                     // 10, 3, 2001
$today = date("Ymd");                         // 20010310
$today = date('h-i-s, j-m-y, it is w Day');   // 05-16-18, 10-03-01, 1631 1618 6 Satpm01
$today = date('\i\t \i\s \t\h\e jS \d\a\y.'); // it is the 10th day.
$today = date("D M j G:i:s T Y");             // Sat Mar 10 17:16:18 MST 2001
$today = date('H:m:s \m \i\s\ \m\o\n\t\h');   // 17:03:18 m is month
$today = date("H:i:s");                       // 17:16:18
$today = date("Y-m-d H:i:s");                 // 2001-03-10 17:16:18 (the MySQL DATETIME format)

Answer 5

<?php
echo "<b>".date('l\, F jS\, Y ')."</b>";
?>

Prints like this

Sunday, December 9th, 2012

Answer 6

Use:

$date = date('m/d/Y h:i:s a', time());

It works.