date(1) User Commands date(1)
NAME
date - print or set the system date and time
SYNOPSIS
date [OPTION]... [+FORMAT]
date [OPTION]... MMDDhhmm[[CC]YY][.ss]
DESCRIPTION
Display date and time in the given FORMAT. With -s, or with
MMDDhhmm[[CC]YY][.ss], set the date and time first.
Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options
too.
-d, --date=STRING
display time described by STRING, not 'now'
--debug
annotate the parsed date, and warn about questionable usage to
standard error
-f, --file=DATEFILE
like --date; once for each line of DATEFILE; if DATEFILE is -,
read names from standard input
-I[FMT], --iso-8601[=FMT]
output date/time in ISO 8601 format. FMT='date' (default),
'hours', 'minutes', 'seconds', or 'ns' for date and time to the
indicated precision. Example: 2006-08-14T02:34:56-06:00
--resolution
output the available resolution of timestamps. Example:
0.000000001
-R, --rfc-email
output date and time in RFC 5322 format. Example: Mon, 14 Aug
2006 02:34:56 +0000
--rfc-3339=FMT
output date/time in RFC 3339 format. FMT='date', 'seconds', or
'ns' for date and time to the indicated precision. Example:
2006-08-14 02:34:56-06:00
-r, --reference=FILE
display the last modification time of FILE
-s, --set=STRING
set time described by STRING
-u, --utc, --universal
print or set Coordinated Universal Time (UTC)
--help display this help and exit
--version
output version information and exit
All options that specify the date to display are mutually exclusive.
I.e.: --date, --file, --reference, --resolution.
FORMAT controls the output. Interpreted sequences are:
FORMAT Example Description
%% % a literal %
%n \n a newline
%t \t a tab
%C 20 century; like %Y, except omit last two digits
%y 99 year (last two digits; 00..99)
%Y 1999 year
%g 99 year of ISO week number (last 2 digits; 00-99); see
%G
%G 1999 year of ISO week number; normally useful only with %V
%a Sun locale's abbreviated weekday name
%A Sunday locale's full weekday name
%b Mar locale's abbreviated month name
%h Mar same as %b
%B March locale's full month name
%m 12 month (01..12)
%d 31 day of month (01..31)
%e 1 day of month, space padded; same as %_d
%D 12/31/99 date (ambiguous); same as %m/%d/%y
%F 1999-12-31 full date; like %+4Y-%m-%d
%x 12/31/99 locale's date (can be ambiguous)
%c ... locale's date and time (e.g., Thu Mar 3 23:05 2005)
%H 23 hour (00..23)
%I 01 hour (01..12)
%k 8 hour, space padded ( 0..23); same as %_H
%l 9 hour, space padded ( 1..12); same as %_I
%M 59 minute (00..59)
%S 60 second (00..60)
%N 123456789 nanoseconds (000000000..999999999)
%s 1970010100 seconds since the Epoch (1970-01-01 00:00 UTC)
%p PM locale's equivalent of AM or PM; blank if not known
%P am like %p, but lower case
%r 1:11:04 PM locale's 12-hour clock time
%R 23:59 24-hour hour and minute; same as %H:%M
%T 23:59:59 time; same as %H:%M:%S
%X 23:59:59 locale's time representation
%j 365 day of year (001..366)
%q 4 quarter of year (1..4)
%u 7 day of week (1..7); 1 is Monday
%w 6 day of week (0..6); 0 is Sunday
%U 52 week of year; Sunday as first day of week (00..53)
%V 52 ISO week number; Monday as first day of week (01..53)
%W 52 week of year; Monday as first day of week (00..53)
%z +0400 +hhmm numeric time zone
%:z +04:00 +hh:mm numeric time zone
%::z +04:00:00 +hh:mm:ss numeric time zone
%:::z +04 numeric time zone to necessary precision; with :
%Z EDT alphabetic time zone abbreviation
By default, date pads numeric fields with zeroes. The following
optional flags may follow '%':
- (hyphen) do not pad the field
_ (underscore) pad with spaces
0 (zero) pad with zeros
+ pad with zeros, and put '+' before future years with >4 digits
^ use upper case if possible
# use opposite case if possible
After any flags comes an optional field width, as a decimal number;
then an optional modifier, which is either E to use the locale's
alternate representations if available, or O to use the locale's
alternate numeric symbols if available.
EXAMPLES
Convert seconds since the Epoch (1970-01-01 UTC) to a date
$ date --date='@2147483647'
Show the time on the west coast of the US (use tzselect(1) to find TZ)
$ TZ='America/Los_Angeles' date
Show the local time for 9AM next Friday on the west coast of the US
$ date --date='TZ="America/Los_Angeles" 09:00 next Fri'
DATE STRING
The --date=STRING is a mostly free format human readable date string
such as "Sun, 29 Feb 2004 16:21:42 -0800" or "2004-02-29 16:21:42" or
even "next Thursday". A date string may contain items indicating
calendar date, time of day, time zone, day of week, relative time,
relative date, and numbers. An empty string indicates the beginning of
the day. The date string format is more complex than is easily
documented here but is fully described in the info documentation.
AUTHOR
Written by David MacKenzie.
REPORTING BUGS
Report bugs to: <bug-coreutils@gnu.org>.
Report any translation bugs to: <https://translationproject.org/team/>.
GNU coreutils home page: <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
General help using GNU software: <https://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>
COPYRIGHT
Copyright © 2026 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+: GNU
GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
SEE ALSO
Full documentation <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/date>
or available locally via: info '(coreutils) date invocation'
GNU coreutils 9.12 September 2026 date(1)
coreutils 9.12 - Generated Tue Sep 22 07:22:16 CDT 2026