How to convert date in to yyyy-MM-dd Format?

Question

Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 GMT 2012

I have to convert above date into below format

2012-12-01

How can i?

i have tried with following method but its not working

public Date ConvertDate(Date date){

    DateFormat df = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd");
    String s = df.format(date);
    String result = s;
    try {
        date=df.parse(result);
    } catch (ParseException e) {
        // TODO Auto-generated catch block
        e.printStackTrace();
    }
    return date;
  }

Solution 1

Use this.

java.util.Date date = new Date("Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 GMT 2012");
SimpleDateFormat formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd");
String format = formatter.format(date);
System.out.println(format);

you will get the output as

2012-12-01

Solution 2

UPDATE My Answer here is now outdated. The Joda-Time project is now in maintenance mode, advising migration to the java.time classes. See the modern solution in the Answer by Ole V.V..

Joda-Time

The accepted answer by NidhishKrishnan is correct.

For fun, here is the same kind of code in Joda-Time 2.3.

// © 2013 Basil Bourque. This source code may be used freely forever by anyone taking full responsibility for doing so.
// import org.joda.time.*;
// import org.joda.time.format.*;

java.util.Date date = new Date(); // A Date object coming from other code.

// Pass the java.util.Date object to constructor of Joda-Time DateTime object.
DateTimeZone kolkataTimeZone = DateTimeZone.forID( "Asia/Kolkata" );
DateTime dateTimeInKolkata = new DateTime( date, kolkataTimeZone );

DateTimeFormatter formatter = DateTimeFormat.forPattern( "yyyy-MM-dd");
System.out.println( "dateTimeInKolkata formatted for date: " + formatter.print( dateTimeInKolkata ) );
System.out.println( "dateTimeInKolkata formatted for ISO 8601: " + dateTimeInKolkata );

When run…

dateTimeInKolkata formatted for date: 2013-12-17
dateTimeInKolkata formatted for ISO 8601: 2013-12-17T14:56:46.658+05:30

Solution 3

String s;
Format formatter;
Date date = new Date();

// 2012-12-01
formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy-MM-dd");
s = formatter.format(date);
System.out.println(s);

Solution 4

Modern answer: Use LocalDate from java.time, the modern Java date and time API, and its toString method:

    LocalDate date = LocalDate.of(2012, Month.DECEMBER, 1); // get from somewhere
    String formattedDate = date.toString();
    System.out.println(formattedDate);

This prints

2012-12-01

A date (whether we’re talking java.util.Date or java.time.LocalDate) doesn’t have a format in it. All it’s got is a toString method that produces some format, and you cannot change the toString method. Fortunately, LocalDate.toString produces exactly the format you asked for.

The Date class is long outdated, and the SimpleDateFormat class that you tried to use, is notoriously troublesome. I recommend you forget about those classes and use java.time instead. The modern API is so much nicer to work with.

Except: it happens that you get a Date from a legacy API that you cannot change or don’t want to change just now. The best thing you can do with it is convert it to java.time.Instant and do any further operations from there:

    Date oldfashoinedDate = // get from somewhere
    LocalDate date = oldfashoinedDate.toInstant()
            .atZone(ZoneId.of("Asia/Beirut"))
            .toLocalDate();

Please substitute your desired time zone if it didn’t happen to be Asia/Beirut. Then proceed as above.

Link: Oracle tutorial: Date Time, explaining how to use java.time.

Solution 5

You can't format the Date itself. You can only get the formatted result in String. Use SimpleDateFormat as mentioned by others.

Moreover, most of the getter methods in Date are deprecated.

View more solutions

Comments

[vels4j]

+1 and new Date() method is deprecated. must use Calendar instead

[mannedear]

@vels4j Why don't you share the code to use Calendar for the replacement of deprecated constructor for Date?