A pattern of special characters is used to specify the format of the date. This example demonstrates some of the characters. For a complete listing, see the javadoc documentation for the SimpleDateFormat class.

Note: This example formats dates using the default locale (which, in the author's case, is Locale.ENGLISH). If the example is run in a different locale, the text (e.g., month names) will not be the same.

Format formatter;

// The year
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yy");    // 02
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy");  // 2002

// The month
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("M");     // 1
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MM");    // 01
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MMM");   // Jan
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MMMM");  // January

// The day
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("d");     // 9
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("dd");    // 09

// The day in week
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("E");     // Wed
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("EEEE");  // Wednesday

// Get today's date
Date date = new Date();

Some examples:

formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("MM/dd/yy");
String s = formatter.format(date);
// 01/09/02

formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("dd-MMM-yy");
s = formatter.format(date);
// 29-Jan-02

// Examples with date and time; see also
// Formatting the Time Using a Custom Format
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy.MM.dd.HH.mm.ss");
s = formatter.format(date);
// 2002.01.29.08.36.33

formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("E, dd MMM yyyy HH:mm:ss Z");
s = formatter.format(date);
// Tue, 09 Jan 2002 22:14:02 -0500