Cookbooks
Python
Chapter 7. Dates and Times
Converting a date into a string

Python:
Converting a date into a string

How to:

Python makes it easy to convert dates to strings. Use the strftime method available on date objects. Here’s how:

from datetime import datetime

# Get the current date and time
now = datetime.now()

# Convert it to a string in the format: Month day, Year
date_string = now.strftime("%B %d, %Y")
print(date_string)  # Output: March 29, 2023 (or current date)

# Format: YYYY-MM-DD
iso_date_string = now.strftime("%Y-%m-%d")
print(iso_date_string)  # Output: 2023-03-29 (or current date)

How I do it

This is how I get an ISO 8601 format date with timezone info:

def datestamp() -> str:
    """ 
    The current date and time with timezone in ISO format.
    """
    return datetime.now().astimezone().isoformat()

Example output: 

>>> datestamp()
'2024-04-04T01:50:04.169159-06:00'

Deep Dive

Historically, date-string conversion has been a staple in programming due to the need to represent dates in a human-readable format.

Alternatives to strftime include using the isoformat method for ISO 8601 format, or third-party libraries like arrow and dateutil that offer more flexible parsing and formatting options.

Implementation-wise, strftime stands for “string format time” and has roots in C programming. Python’s strftime interprets format codes like %Y for the year and %m for the month, allowing for almost endless customizability.

See Also

To dive deeper into Python’s date and time functions:

Comparing two datesGetting the current date