Convert a string to datetime object in python

Question

I have a date string defined as followed:

datestr = '2011-05-01'

I want to convert this into a datetime object so i used the following code

dateobj = datetime.datetime.strptime(datestr,'%Y-%m-%d')
print dateobj

But what gets printed is: 2011-05-01 00:00:00. I just need 2011-05-01. What needs to be changed in my code ?

Thank You

This is a question that could easily have been answered by reading the documentation. — Björn Pollex
– Björn Pollex, Commented May 3, 2011 at 11:05
@BjörnPollex I just found this question and it helped me within 10 seconds. Finding the answer on the documentation page would have taken me a lot longer than that. StackOverflow is popular for a reason, and it's not a bad reason. — Richard
– Richard, Commented Jan 15, 2016 at 17:56

Alexander Oh · Accepted Answer · 2016-01-11 16:42:31Z

12

dateobj.date() will give you the datetime.date object, such as datetime.date(2011, 5, 1)

Use:

dateobj = datetime.datetime.strptime(datestr,'%Y-%m-%d').date()

See also: Python documentation on datetime.

edited Jan 11, 2016 at 16:42

Alexander Oh

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answered May 3, 2011 at 10:55

eumiro

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2 Comments

Mu Mind Over a year ago

Kinda lame that it's necessary to create a datetime object and then throw away the time...

Sven Marnach Over a year ago

@MuMind: In this simple case, you could also use datetime.date(*map(int, datestr.split("-"))) to create a date object directly.

Sven Marnach · Accepted Answer · 2011-05-03 10:57:32Z

2

As the name suggests, datetime objects always contain a date and a time. If you don't need the time, simply ignore it. To print it in the same format as before, use

print dateobj.strftime('%Y-%m-%d')

answered May 3, 2011 at 10:57

Sven Marnach

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Comments

garnertb · Accepted Answer · 2011-05-03 11:01:10Z

1

dateobj = datetime.datetime.strptime(datestr,'%Y-%m-%d').date()
print dateobj

answered May 3, 2011 at 11:01

garnertb

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