How to make <input type="date"> supported on all browsers? Any alternatives?

Javascript Problem Overview

I'm working with HTML5 elements input attributes and only Google Chrome supports the date, time attributes. I tried http://modernizr.com/">Modernizr</a> but I can't understand on how to integrate it on my website(on how to code it/what is the syntax/includes). Any code snippet there on how to work with date, time attributes to all browsers.

Javascript Solutions

Solution 1 - Javascript

Any browser that does not support the input type date will default to the standard type, which is text, so all you have to do is check the type property (not the attribute), if it's not date, the date input is not supported by the browser, and you add your own datepicker:

if ( $('[type="date"]').prop('type') != 'date' ) {
    $('[type="date"]').datepicker();
}

FIDDLE

You can of course use any datepicker you want, jQuery UI's datepicker is probably the one most commonly used, but it does add quite a bit of javascript if you're not using the UI library for anything else, but there are hundreds of alternative datepickers to choose from.

The type attribute never changes, the browser will only fall back to the default text type for the property, so one has to check the property.
The attribute can still be used as a selector, as in the example above.

Solution 2 - Javascript

Modernizr doesn't actually change anything about how the new HTML5 input types are handled. It's a feature detector, not a shim (except for <header>, <article>, etc., which it shims to be handled as block elements similar to <div>).

To use <input type='date'>, you'd need to check Modernizr.inputtypes.date in your own script, and if it's false, turn on another plugin that provides a date selector. You have thousands to choose from; Modernizr maintains a non-exhaustive list of polyfills that might give you somewhere to start. Alternatively, you could just let it go - all browsers fall back to text when presented with an input type they don't recognize, so the worst that can happen is that your user has to type in the date. (You might want to give them a placeholder or use something like jQuery.maskedinput to keep them on track.)

Solution 3 - Javascript

You asked for Modernizr example, so here you go. This code uses Modernizr to detect whether the 'date' input type is supported. If it isn't supported, then it fails back to JQueryUI datepicker.

Note: You will need to download JQueryUI and possibly change the paths to the CSS and JS files in your own code.

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
    <head>
        <title>Modernizer Detect 'date' input type</title>
        <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="jquery-ui-1.10.3/themes/base/jquery.ui.all.css"/>
        <script type="text/javascript" src="http://ajax.aspnetcdn.com/ajax/modernizr/modernizr-1.7-development-only.js"></script>
        <script type="text/javascript" src="http://code.jquery.com/jquery-1.10.2.min.js"></script>
        <script type="text/javascript" src="jquery-ui-1.10.3/ui/jquery.ui.core.js"></script>
        <script type="text/javascript" src="jquery-ui-1.10.3/ui/jquery.ui.widget.js"></script>
        <script type="text/javascript" src="jquery-ui-1.10.3/ui/jquery.ui.datepicker.js"></script>
        <script type="text/javascript">
            $(function(){
                if(!Modernizr.inputtypes.date) {
                    console.log("The 'date' input type is not supported, so using JQueryUI datepicker instead.");
                    $("#theDate").datepicker();
                }
            });
        </script>
    </head>
    <body>
        <form>
            <input id="theDate" type="date"/>
        </form>
    </body>
</html>

I hope this works for you.

Solution 4 - Javascript

   <script>
      var datefield = document.createElement("input")
      datefield.setAttribute("type", "date")
      if (datefield.type != "date") { // if browser doesn't support input type="date", load files for jQuery UI Date Picker
         document.write('<link href="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8/themes/base/jquery-ui.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />\n')
         document.write('<script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.4/jquery.min.js"><\/script>\n')
         document.write('<script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8/jquery-ui.min.js"><\/script>\n')
      }
   </script>

 <script>
    if (datefield.type != "date") { // if browser doesn't support input type="date", initialize date picker widget:
       jQuery(function($) { // on document.ready
           $('#birthday').datepicker();
       }); <- missing semicolon
    }
 </script>

<body>
 <form>
   <b>Date of birth:</b>
   <input type="date" id="birthday" name="birthday" size="20">
   <input type="button" value="Submit" name="B1">
 </form>
</body>

SOURCE 1 & SOURCE 2

Solution 5 - Javascript

This is bit of an opinion piece, but we had great success with WebShims. It can decay cleanly to use jQuery datepicker if native is not available. Demo here

Solution 6 - Javascript

Just use <script src="modernizr.js"></script> in the <head> section, and the script will add classes which help you to separate the two cases: if it's supported by the current browser, or if it's not.

Plus follow the links posted in this thread. It will help you: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/12455506/html5-input-type-date-color-range-support-in-firefox-and-internet-explorer

Solution 7 - Javascript

Chrome Version 50.0.2661.87 m does not support the mm-dd-yy format when assigned to a variable. It uses yy-mm-dd. IE and Firefox work as expected.

Solution 8 - Javascript

best easy and working solution i have found is, working on following browsers

Google Chrome
Firefox
Microsoft Edge

Safari

<!doctype html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="utf-8">
<title>Untitled Document</title>
</head>

<body>
<h2>Poly Filler Script for Date/Time</h2>
<form method="post" action="">
    <input type="date" />
    <br/><br/>
    <input type="time" />
</form>

<script src="https://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.11.3/jquery.min.js"></script>
<script src="http://cdn.jsdelivr.net/webshim/1.12.4/extras/modernizr-custom.js"></script>
<script src="http://cdn.jsdelivr.net/webshim/1.12.4/polyfiller.js"></script>
<script>
  webshims.setOptions('waitReady', false);
  webshims.setOptions('forms-ext', {type: 'date'});
  webshims.setOptions('forms-ext', {type: 'time'});
  webshims.polyfill('forms forms-ext');
</script>

</body>
</html>

Solution 9 - Javascript

Two-Script-Include-Solution (2019):

Just include Better-Dom and Better-Dateinput-Polyfill in your scripts section.

Here is a Demo:
http://chemerisuk.github.io/better-dateinput-polyfill/

Solution 10 - Javascript

<html>
<head>
<title>Date picker works for all browsers(IE, Firefox, Chrome)</title>
<script>
    var datefield = document.createElement("input")
    datefield.setAttribute("type", "date")
    if (datefield.type != "date") { // if browser doesn't support input type="date", load files for jQuery UI Date Picker
        document.write('<link href="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8/themes/base/jquery-ui.css" rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" />\n')
        document.write('<script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jquery/1.4/jquery.min.js"><\/script>\n')
        document.write('<script src="http://ajax.googleapis.com/ajax/libs/jqueryui/1.8/jquery-ui.min.js"><\/script>\n')
    }
</script>

<script>
    if (datefield.type != "date") { // if browser doesn't support input type="date", initialize date picker widget:
        jQuery(function($) { // on document.ready
            $('#start_date').datepicker({
                dateFormat: 'yy-mm-dd'
            });
            $('#end_date').datepicker({
                dateFormat: 'yy-mm-dd'
            });
        })
    }
</script>
</head>
<body>
    <input name="start_date" id="start_date" type="date" required>
    <input name="end_date" id="end_date" required>
</body>
</html>

Solution 11 - Javascript

I was having problems with this, maintaining the UK dd/mm/yyyy format, I initially used the answer from adeneo https://stackoverflow.com/a/18021130/243905 but that didnt work in safari for me so changed to this, which as far as I can tell works all over - using the jquery-ui datepicker, jquery validation.

if ($('[type="date"]').prop('type') !== 'date') {
    //for reloading/displaying the ISO format back into input again
	var val = $('[type="date"]').each(function () {
		var val = $(this).val();
		if (val !== undefined && val.indexOf('-') > 0) {
			var arr = val.split('-');
			$(this).val(arr[2] + '/' + arr[1] + '/' + arr[0]);
		}
	});

    //add in the datepicker
	$('[type="date"]').datepicker(datapickeroptions);

    //stops the invalid date when validated in safari
	jQuery.validator.methods["date"] = function (value, element) {
		var shortDateFormat = "dd/mm/yy";
		var res = true;
		try {
			$.datepicker.parseDate(shortDateFormat, value);
		} catch (error) {
			res = false;
		}
		return res;
	}
}

Content Type	Original Author	Original Content on Stackoverflow
Question	leonardeveloper	View Question on Stackoverflow
Solution 1 - Javascript	adeneo	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 2 - Javascript	jfmatt	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 3 - Javascript	Tim S	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 4 - Javascript	Ritabrata Gautam	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 5 - Javascript	Antti Haapala -- Слава Україні	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 6 - Javascript	Rápli András	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 7 - Javascript	Kelvin	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 8 - Javascript	Kashif Latif	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 9 - Javascript	Bijan	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 10 - Javascript	Amol Shirude	View Answer on Stackoverflow
Solution 11 - Javascript	nat	View Answer on Stackoverflow