Wikipedia:Date math
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Date math on Wikipedia is done with variables, templates and the #time parser function.
In articles, it is almost always preferred to specify a specific static date for a statement or event rather than an automatically generated date. Wikipedia:As of describes how to properly specify such dates.
Current date and time
[edit]| Built-in variables | Templates based on them | What you see | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|
{{CURRENTTIMESTAMP}}
|
20260728010651 | ||
{{CURRENTYEAR}}
|
2026 | ||
{{UTC}}
|
2026-07-28 01:06 UTC | also uses {{CURRENTMONTH}} {{CURRENTDAY2}} {{CURRENTTIME}} | |
{{CURRENTDATE}}
|
01:06, Tuesday, July 28, 2026 (UTC) | also uses {{CURRENTTIME}} {{CURRENTDAYNAME}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTDAY}} | |
{{CURRENTJULIANDAY}}
|
2461249.5464236 | current Julian day also uses {{CURRENTMONTH}} {{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTHOUR}} {{CURRENTMINUTE}} {{CURRENTSECOND}} | |
{{CURRENTMONTH}}
|
07 | ||
{{CURRENTMONTH1}}
|
7 | trims leading zero | |
{{CURRENTMONTHNAME}}
|
July | ||
{{Month+1}}
|
August | ||
{{Month-1}}
|
June | ||
{{Month-2}}
|
May | ||
{{CURRENTDAY}}
|
28 | day of month | |
{{CURRENTDOW}}
|
2 | day of week | |
{{CURRENTDAYNAME}}
|
Tuesday | ||
{{#time:l|-1 day}}
|
Monday | ||
{{#time:l}}
|
Tuesday | ||
{{#time:l|+1 day}}
|
Wednesday | ||
| Any variable or template with a resolution of smaller than one day should not be placed in articles. These variables only indicate when the article was parsed and cached; they may lag by many hours or even days compared to the time the page is viewed. | |||
{{CURRENTTIME}}
|
01:06 | ||
{{CURRENTHOUR}}
|
01 | ||
{{#time:H|+1 hour}}
|
02 | ||
{{Current hour}}
|
1 | trims leading zero | |
{{#time:i}}
|
06 | ||
{{CURRENTMINUTE}}
|
06 | ||
{{Current minute}}
|
6 | trims leading zero | |
{{#time:s}}
|
51 | ||
{{CURRENTSECOND}}
|
51 | ||
Computed date and time
[edit]| Template name | Usage | Output | Comment |
|---|---|---|---|
{{Ordinal date}}
|
{{Ordinal date
|
74 | returns ordinal date (day of year) |
{{Ordinal date
|
75 | +1 due to leap year in 2008 | |
{{WEEKDAY}}
|
{{WEEKDAY
|
2 | returns day of week |
{{WEEKDAYNAME|{{WEEKDAY
|
Tuesday | ||
{{JULIANDAY}}
|
{{JULIANDAY
|
2455069 | |
{{JULIANDAY|{{CURRENTYEAR}}|{{CURRENTMONTH}}|{{CURRENTDAY}}}}
|
2461250 | Nesting templates to get the value of the current Julian day with no decimal portion. Useful for date math between a set point and the current date. | |
{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP}}
|
{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP
|
20090825120000 | same format as {{CURRENTTIMESTAMP}} |
{{#time:D Y-m-d|{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP
|
Tue 2009-08-25 | ||
{{JULIANDAY.DAYNAME}}
|
{{JULIANDAY.DAYNAME
|
Tuesday | same format as {{CURRENTDAYNAME}}
Note: 2455069 mod 7 = 1 |
{{JULIANDAY.DAYNAME
|
Tuesday |
Julian dates or day numbers can be used for date calculations. A simple example follows:
- 90 days from 25 December 2006 is:
- Code:
{{#time:j F Y|{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP|{{JULIANDAY|2006|12|25}}+90}}}}→ 25 March 2007
- Code:
- 90 days from 25 December 2007 is:
- Code:
{{#time:j F Y|{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP|{{JULIANDAY|2007|12|25}}+90}}}}→ 24 March 2008 (1 day less than first example due to leap year in 2008)
- Code:
Fancy stuff
[edit]| {{today cell}} | {{tomorrow cell}} |