How to Format date using strftime() in Python ?

Last Updated : 23 Jul, 2025

In this article, we will see how to format date using strftime() in Python. localtime() and gmtime() returns a tuple representing a time and this tuple is converted into a string as specified by the format argument using python time method strftime().

Syntax:

time.strftime(format[, sec])

sec: This is the time in number of seconds to be formatted.

format: This is the directive or format code which would be used to format.

Directive or format code	Returned Valued	Example
%Y	Full year with century	2021,2022
%y	Year without century with zero padded value	00,01,....21,22...,99
%-y	Year without century	0,1...,99
%m	Month with zero padded value	01-12
%-m	Month without zero padded value	1-12
%B	Full month name	January, February,..., December
%b	Short form of month	Jan, Feb,...,Dec
%A	Full weekday name	Sunday, Monday,..
%a	Short form of weekday name	Sun, Mon,..
%w	Weekday as decimal value	0-6
%d	Days with zero padded value	01-31
%-d	Days with decimal value	1-31
%H	Hour (24-hour clock) as a zero-padded value.	00-23
%-H	Hour (24-hour clock) without zero-padded value.	0,1,...,23
%I	Hour (12-hour clock) as a zero-padded value.	01-12
%-I	Hour (12-hour clock) without zero-padded value.	1-12
%M	Mins with zero-padded	00-59
%-M	Mins without zero padded value	0-59
%S	Secs with zero padded value	00-59
%-S	Secs without zero padded value	0-59
%f	Micro Secs with zero-padded value	000000 - 999999
%p	Locale’s AM or PM.	AM/PM
%j	Day of the year with zero padded value	001-366
%-j	Day of the year without zero padded value	1-366
%z	UTC offset in the form +HHMM or -HHMM.
%Z	Time zone name.
%C	Locale’s appropriate date and time	Fri Apr 02 02:09:07 2020
%x	Locale’s appropriate date	02/04/22
%X	Locale’s appropriate time	02:04:22
%W	Week number of the year. Monday as first day of week	00-53
%U	Week number of the year. Sunday as first day of week	00-53

Below are some examples for better understanding.

Example 1:

Python3

from datetime import datetime

# current time and date
# datetime object
time = datetime.now()
print("Without formatting:", time)

# formatting date using strftime
print("After formatting:", time.strftime("%b %d, %Y"))

Output

Without formatting: 2022-11-29 12:59:08.088819
After formatting: Nov 29, 2022

Output:

Example 2:

Python3

from datetime import datetime

# current time and date
# datetime object
time = datetime.now()
print("Without formatting:", time)

# formatting date using strftime
print("Year", time.strftime("%Y"))
print("Month name", time.strftime("%B"))
print("Day", time.strftime("%d"))

Output:

Example 3:

Python3

from datetime import datetime

# current time and date
# datetime object
time = datetime.now()

# formatting date using strftime
# format = MM/DD/YY
print(time.strftime("%m/%d/%y"))

# format = Month D, Yr
print(time.strftime("%B %d, %Y"))

# time formatting
# HH:MM:SS
print(time.strftime("%H:%M:%S"))