Convert string date to timestamp in Python

How to convert a string in the format "%d/%m/%Y" to timestamp?

"01/12/2011" -> 1322697600

>>> import time
>>> import datetime
>>> s = "01/12/2011"
>>> time.mktime(datetime.datetime.strptime(s, "%d/%m/%Y").timetuple())
1322697600.0

I use ciso8601, which is 62x faster than datetime's strptime.

t = "01/12/2011"
ts = ciso8601.parse_datetime(t)
# to get time in seconds:
time.mktime(ts.timetuple())

You can learn more here.

>>> int(datetime.datetime.strptime('01/12/2011', '%d/%m/%Y').strftime("%s"))
1322683200

To convert the string into a date object:

from datetime import date, datetime

date_string = "01/12/2011"
date_object = date(*map(int, reversed(date_string.split("/"))))
assert date_object == datetime.strptime(date_string, "%d/%m/%Y").date()

The way to convert the date object into POSIX timestamp depends on timezone. From Converting datetime.date to UTC timestamp in Python:

• date object represents midnight in UTC

   import calendar
  
   timestamp1 = calendar.timegm(utc_date.timetuple())
   timestamp2 = (utc_date.toordinal() - date(1970, 1, 1).toordinal()) * 24*60*60
   assert timestamp1 == timestamp2
  

• date object represents midnight in local time

    import time
  
    timestamp3 = time.mktime(local_date.timetuple())
    assert timestamp3 != timestamp1 or (time.gmtime() == time.localtime())
  

The timestamps are different unless midnight in UTC and in local time is the same time instance.

Simply use datetime.datetime.strptime:

import datetime
stime = "01/12/2011"
print(datetime.datetime.strptime(stime, "%d/%m/%Y").timestamp())

Result:

1322697600

To use UTC instead of the local timezone use .replace:

datetime.datetime.strptime(stime, "%d/%m/%Y").replace(tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc).timestamp()

The answer depends also on your input date timezone. If your date is a local date, then you can use mktime() like katrielalex said - only I don't see why he used datetime instead of this shorter version:

>>> time.mktime(time.strptime('01/12/2011', "%d/%m/%Y"))
1322694000.0

But observe that my result is different than his, as I am probably in a different TZ (and the result is timezone-free UNIX timestamp)

Now if the input date is already in UTC, than I believe the right solution is:

>>> calendar.timegm(time.strptime('01/12/2011', '%d/%m/%Y'))
1322697600

A lot of these answers don't bother to consider that the date is naive to begin with

To be correct, you need to make the naive date a timezone aware datetime first

import datetime
import pytz
# naive datetime
d = datetime.datetime.strptime('01/12/2011', '%d/%m/%Y')
>>> datetime.datetime(2011, 12, 1, 0, 0)

# add proper timezone
pst = pytz.timezone('America/Los_Angeles')
d = pst.localize(d)
>>> datetime.datetime(2011, 12, 1, 0, 0,
tzinfo=<DstTzInfo 'America/Los_Angeles' PST-1 day, 16:00:00 STD>)

# convert to UTC timezone
utc = pytz.UTC
d = d.astimezone(utc)
>>> datetime.datetime(2011, 12, 1, 8, 0, tzinfo=<UTC>)

# epoch is the beginning of time in the UTC timestamp world
epoch = datetime.datetime(1970,1,1,0,0,0,tzinfo=pytz.UTC)
>>> datetime.datetime(1970, 1, 1, 0, 0, tzinfo=<UTC>)

# get the total second difference
ts = (d - epoch).total_seconds()
>>> 1322726400.0

Also:

Be careful, using pytz for tzinfo in a datetime.datetime DOESN'T WORK for many timezones. See https://stackoverflow.com/questions/23699115/datetime-with-pytz-timezone-different-offset-depending-on-how-tzinfo-is-set

# Don't do this:
d = datetime.datetime(2011, 12, 1,0,0,0, tzinfo=pytz.timezone('America/Los_Angeles'))
>>> datetime.datetime(2011, 1, 12, 0, 0, 
tzinfo=<DstTzInfo 'America/Los_Angeles' LMT-1 day, 16:07:00 STD>)
# tzinfo in not PST but LMT here, with a 7min offset !!!

# when converting to UTC:
d = d.astimezone(pytz.UTC)
>>> datetime.datetime(2011, 1, 12, 7, 53, tzinfo=<UTC>)
# you end up with an offset

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Local_mean_time

First you must the strptime class to convert the string to a struct_time format.

Then just use mktime from there to get your float.

I would suggest dateutil:

import dateutil.parser
dateutil.parser.parse("01/12/2011", dayfirst=True).timestamp()

Seems to be quite efficient:

import datetime
day, month, year = '01/12/2011'.split('/')
datetime.datetime(int(year), int(month), int(day)).timestamp()

1.61 µs ± 120 ns per loop (mean ± std. dev. of 7 runs, 100000 loops each)

you can convert to isoformat

my_date = '2020/08/08'
my_date = my_date.replace('/','-') # just to adapte to your question
date_timestamp = datetime.datetime.fromisoformat(my_date).timestamp()

I would give a answer for beginners (like me):

You have the date string "01/12/2011". Then it can be written by the format "%d/%m/%Y". If you want to format to another format like "July 9, 2015", here a good cheatsheet.

• Import the datetime library.

• Use the datetime.datetime class to handle date and time combinations.

• Use the strptime method to convert a string datetime to a object datetime.

• Finally, use the timestamp method to get the Unix epoch time as a float. So,

import datetime
print( int( datetime.datetime.strptime( "01/12/2011","%d/%m/%Y" ).timestamp() ) )

# prints 1322712000

You can refer this following link for using strptime function from datetime.datetime, to convert date from any format along with time zone.

https://docs.python.org/3/library/datetime.html#strftime-and-strptime-behavior

just use datetime.timestamp(your datetime instanse), datetime instance contains the timezone infomation, so the timestamp will be a standard utc timestamp. if you transform the datetime to timetuple, it will lose it's timezone, so the result will be error. if you want to provide an interface, you should write like this: int(datetime.timestamp(time_instance)) * 1000

A simple function to get UNIX Epoch time.

NOTE: This function assumes the input date time is in UTC format (Refer to comments here).

def utctimestamp(ts: str, DATETIME_FORMAT: str = "%d/%m/%Y"):
    import datetime, calendar
    ts = datetime.datetime.utcnow() if ts is None else datetime.datetime.strptime(ts, DATETIME_FORMAT)
    return calendar.timegm(ts.utctimetuple())

Usage:

>>> utctimestamp("01/12/2011")
1322697600
>>> utctimestamp("2011-12-01", "%Y-%m-%d")
1322697600

You can go both directions, unix epoch <==> datetime :

import datetime
import time


the_date = datetime.datetime.fromtimestamp( 1639763585 )



unix_time = time.mktime(the_date.timetuple())

assert  ( the_date == datetime.datetime.fromtimestamp(unix_time) ) & \
        ( time.mktime(the_date.timetuple()) == unix_time         )