How to use the Ruby strftime method

If you want to format dates in Ruby, you can use the strftime method.

The strftime method is defined by the Time class, and it accepts a string containing special format characters.

For example, if you want to get the current date as a string, you can use this code:

Time.now.strftime("%d %B %Y")
# "02 February 2020"

In the example above, we’re using some of the typical format characters like %d for day, %B for month, and %Y for year.

There are many different format characters you can use with strftime.

You can find the complete list of special characters in the strftime documentation.

Parsing Dates & Times

For the cases when you have a date or time as a string, you can use the strptime method to parse it and convert it to a Time object.

Here’s an example:

Time.strptime("02 Feb 2020", "%d %b %Y")
# 2020-02-02 00:00:00 +0100

Notice that you need to provide the format of the string as the second argument to strptime.

When you want to get the current timestamp as an integer, you can use the Time#to_i method.

Time.now.to_i
# 1581167865

It’s also possible to create a Time object from a timestamp using the Time#at method:

Time.at(1581167865)
# 2020-02-02 16:44:25 +0100

Converting Time Zones

Let’s say you want to convert between time zones, you can use the in_time_zone method.

Here’s an example:

time = Time.now
time.in_time_zone("Pacific Time (US & Canada)")

Note: This method is only available for Rails applications.

Formatting Dates & Times With Rails

In case you’re building a Rails application, you can use the to_formatted_s method to format dates and times.

Here’s an example:

time = Time.now
time.to_formatted_s(format: :long)
# June 27, 2022 19:50

Note: This method is only available for Rails applications.

Summary

In this article, you have learned how to format dates using the strftime method and how to parse a string into a Time object using the strptime method. You also learned how to convert timestamps to Time objects and how to convert between time zones.

If you’re building a Rails application, you can use the to_formatted_s method to format dates & times.

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