Date/Time Functions
PHP Manual

date_parse

Returns associative array with detailed info about given date/time

Description

array date_parse(string $datetime)

date_parse parses the given datetime string according to the same rules as strtotime and DateTimeImmutable::__construct. Instead of returning a Unix timestamp (with strtotime) or a DateTimeImmutable object (with DateTimeImmutable::__construct), it returns an associative array with the information that it could detect in the given datetime string.

If no information about a certain group of elements can be found, these array elements will be set to false or are missing. If needed for constructing a timestamp or DateTimeImmutable object from the same datetime string, more fields can be set to a non-false value. See the examples for cases where that happens.

Parameters

datetime

Date/time in format accepted by DateTimeImmutable::__construct.

Return Values

Returns array with information about the parsed date/time.

The returned array has keys for year, month, day, hour, minute, second, fraction, and is_localtime.

If is_localtime is present then zone_type indicates the type of timezone. For type 1 (UTC offset) the zone, is_dst fields are added; for type 2 (abbreviation) the fields tz_abbr, is_dst are added; and for type 3 (timezone identifier) the tz_abbr, tz_id are added.

If relative time elements are present in the datetime string such as +3 days, the then returned array includes a nested array with the key relative. This array then contains the keys year, month, day, hour, minute, second, and if necessary weekday, and weekdays, depending on the string that was passed in.

The array includes warning_count and warnings fields. The first one indicate how many warnings there were. The keys of elements warnings array indicate the position in the given datetime where the warning occurred, with the string value describing the warning itself.

The array also contains error_count and errors fields. The first one indicate how many errors were found. The keys of elements errors array indicate the position in the given datetime where the error occurred, with the string value describing the error itself.

Warning

The number of array elements in the warnings and errors arrays might be less than warning_count or error_count if they occurred at the same position.

Errors/Exceptions

In case the date/time format has an error, the element 'errors' will contain the error messages.

Changelog

Version Description
7.2.0 The zone element of the returned array represents seconds instead of minutes now, and its sign is inverted. For instance -120 is now 7200.

Examples

Example #1 A date_parse example with a comprehensive datetime string

<?php
var_dump(date_parse("2006-12-12 10:00:00.5"));
?>

The above example will output:

array(12) {
  ["year"]=>
  int(2006)
  ["month"]=>
  int(12)
  ["day"]=>
  int(12)
  ["hour"]=>
  int(10)
  ["minute"]=>
  int(0)
  ["second"]=>
  int(0)
  ["fraction"]=>
  float(0.5)
  ["warning_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["warnings"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["error_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["errors"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["is_localtime"]=>
  bool(false)
}

The timezone elements only show up if they are included in the given datetime string. In that case there will always be a zone_type element and a few more depending on its value.

Example #2 date_parse with timezone abbreviation information

<?php
var_dump(date_parse("June 2nd, 2022, 10:28:17 BST"));
?>

The above example will output:

array(16) {
  ["year"]=>
  int(2022)
  ["month"]=>
  int(6)
  ["day"]=>
  int(2)
  ["hour"]=>
  int(10)
  ["minute"]=>
  int(28)
  ["second"]=>
  int(17)
  ["fraction"]=>
  float(0)
  ["warning_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["warnings"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["error_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["errors"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["is_localtime"]=>
  bool(true)
  ["zone_type"]=>
  int(2)
  ["zone"]=>
  int(0)
  ["is_dst"]=>
  bool(true)
  ["tz_abbr"]=>
  string(3) "BST"
}

Example #3 date_parse with timezone identifier information

<?php
var_dump(date_parse("June 2nd, 2022, 10:28:17 Europe/London"));
?>

The above example will output:

array(14) {
  ["year"]=>
  int(2022)
  ["month"]=>
  int(6)
  ["day"]=>
  int(2)
  ["hour"]=>
  int(10)
  ["minute"]=>
  int(28)
  ["second"]=>
  int(17)
  ["fraction"]=>
  float(0)
  ["warning_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["warnings"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["error_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["errors"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["is_localtime"]=>
  bool(true)
  ["zone_type"]=>
  int(3)
  ["tz_id"]=>
  string(13) "Europe/London"
}

If a more minimal datetime string is parsed, less information is available. In this example, all the time parts are returned as false.

Example #4 date_parse with a minimal string

<?php
var_dump(date_parse("June 2nd, 2022"));
?>

The above example will output:

array(12) {
  ["year"]=>
  int(2022)
  ["month"]=>
  int(6)
  ["day"]=>
  int(2)
  ["hour"]=>
  bool(false)
  ["minute"]=>
  bool(false)
  ["second"]=>
  bool(false)
  ["fraction"]=>
  bool(false)
  ["warning_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["warnings"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["error_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["errors"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["is_localtime"]=>
  bool(false)
}

Relative formats do not influence the values parsed from absolute formats, but are parsed into the "relative" element.

Example #5 date_parse with relative formats

<?php
var_dump(date_parse("2006-12-12 10:00:00.5 +1 week +1 hour"));
?>

The above example will output:

array(13) {
  ["year"]=>
  int(2006)
  ["month"]=>
  int(12)
  ["day"]=>
  int(12)
  ["hour"]=>
  int(10)
  ["minute"]=>
  int(0)
  ["second"]=>
  int(0)
  ["fraction"]=>
  float(0.5)
  ["warning_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["warnings"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["error_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["errors"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["is_localtime"]=>
  bool(false)
  ["relative"]=>
  array(6) {
    ["year"]=>
    int(0)
    ["month"]=>
    int(0)
    ["day"]=>
    int(7)
    ["hour"]=>
    int(1)
    ["minute"]=>
    int(0)
    ["second"]=>
    int(0)
  }
}

Some stanzas, such as Thursday will set the time portion of the string to 0. If Thursday is passed to DateTimeImmutable::__construct it would also have resulted in the hour, minute, second, and fraction being set to 0. In the example below, the year element is however left as false.

Example #6 date_parse with side-effects

<?php
var_dump(date_parse("Thursday, June 2nd"));
?>

The above example will output:

array(13) {
  ["year"]=>
  bool(false)
  ["month"]=>
  int(6)
  ["day"]=>
  int(2)
  ["hour"]=>
  int(0)
  ["minute"]=>
  int(0)
  ["second"]=>
  int(0)
  ["fraction"]=>
  float(0)
  ["warning_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["warnings"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["error_count"]=>
  int(0)
  ["errors"]=>
  array(0) {
  }
  ["is_localtime"]=>
  bool(false)
  ["relative"]=>
  array(7) {
    ["year"]=>
    int(0)
    ["month"]=>
    int(0)
    ["day"]=>
    int(0)
    ["hour"]=>
    int(0)
    ["minute"]=>
    int(0)
    ["second"]=>
    int(0)
    ["weekday"]=>
    int(4)
  }
}

See Also

  • date_parse_from_format for parsing a datetime with a specific given format
  • checkdate for Gregorian date validation
  • getdate