---
title: "PHP date format guide with practical examples"
url: https://daily.dev/posts/php-date-format-guide-with-practical-examples-mtz6p5v6k
source_url: https://benjamincrozat.com/php-date-format
type: article
source: "Benjamin Crozat"
published: 2026-05-31T07:50:55.681Z
updated: 2026-05-31T09:15:17.327Z
tags: ["php"]
reading_time: 6
upvotes: 6
comments: 0
language: en
---

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# PHP date format guide with practical examples

**[Benjamin Crozat](https://daily.dev/sources/benjamincrozat)** · 6 min read · 6 upvotes · 0 comments

## Summary

A practical guide to formatting dates in PHP covering the difference between date() and DateTimeImmutable::format(), when to use each, a cheat sheet of common format patterns and tokens, handling Unix timestamps, timezone management, escaping text in format strings, and working with microseconds and milliseconds.

## Full article

daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: <https://benjamincrozat.com/php-date-format>

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---

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