idate()

idate() — Format a local time/date part as integer.

Built-in function of PHP 8.5. The manual lists it as available in PHP 5, PHP 7, PHP 8. This page is the reference card: signature, parameters and return value, plus the changelog and the example the manual provides.

What it does

Returns a number formatted according to the given format string using the given integer timestamp or the current local time if no timestamp is given. In other words, timestamp is optional and defaults to the value of time().

Signature

idate(string $format, ?int $timestamp = null): int|false

Parameters

Parameter	Type	What it takes
$format	string	The following characters are recognized in the format parameter string format character Description B Swatch Beat/Internet Time d Day of the month h Hour (12 hour format) H Hour (24 hour format) i Minutes I (uppercase i) returns 1 if DST is activated, 0 otherwise L (uppercase l) returns 1 for leap year, 0 otherwise m Month number N ISO-8601 day of the week (1 for Monday through 7 for Sunday) o ISO-8601 year (4 ...
$timestamp	?int	The optional timestamp parameter is an int Unix timestamp that defaults to the current local time if timestamp is omitted or null. In other words, it defaults to the value of time().

Return value

Returns an int on success, or false on failure. As idate() always returns an int and as they can't start with a "0", idate() may return fewer digits than you would expect. See the example below.

Example

A runnable snippet:

$timestamp = strtotime('1st January 2004'); // 1072915200 // this prints the year in a two digit format // however, as this would start with a "0", it // only prints "4" echo idate('y', $timestamp) . "\n"; $timestamp = strtotime('1st January 2024'); // 1704067200 echo idate('y', $timestamp);

Output:

4 24

Changelog

Version	Change
8.2.0	Adds the N (ISO-8601 day of the week) and o (ISO-8601 year) format characters.
8.0.0	timestamp is nullable now.