--- title: [RFC] Duration class | daily.dev description: A PHP internals mailing list thread discussing a proposed RFC to introduce a new `Time\Duration` class in PHP 8.6. The class is designed to represent... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-9e9zzqshj twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: [RFC] Duration class | daily.dev og:description: A PHP internals mailing list thread discussing a proposed RFC to introduce a new `Time\Duration` class in PHP 8.6. The class is designed to represent... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-9e9zzqshj og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/9e9zZqSHJ.png og:image:alt: [RFC] Duration class og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # [RFC] Duration class **[externals.io](https://daily.dev/sources/externals)** · 65 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary A PHP internals mailing list thread discussing a proposed RFC to introduce a new `Time\Duration` class in PHP 8.6. The class is designed to represent stopwatch-style durations (not calendar periods) to improve developer experience for timeout APIs, particularly the new Polling API. The RFC proposes a minimal API with seconds+nanoseconds internal representation, constructors up to hours, and ISO-8601 period string parsing. Discussion covers design decisions including omitting floating-point methods to avoid precision issues, choosing the `Time` namespace over `DateTime`, limiting ISO-8601 serialization to a future release, and API method naming (add/sub vs. sum). The RFC is intended as the first step toward a modernized date/time API in PHP, following the pattern of new namespaced APIs introduced in PHP 8.2–8.5. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [\[RFC\] Duration class](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-3etjrdmbp) · externals.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [\[RFC\] Duration class](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-ajrzp2m2x) · externals.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [\[RFC\] Duration class](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-kszxgbqns) · externals.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [\[RFC\] Duration class](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-ismlaelql) · externals.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [\[RFC\] Duration class](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-bsqz20wx4) · externals.io · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- Tags: [#architecture](https://daily.dev/tags/architecture), [#php](https://daily.dev/tags/php) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-9e9zzqshj) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"[RFC] Duration class","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-9e9zzqshj","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/rfc-duration-class-9e9zzqshj"},"datePublished":"2026-06-22T17:45:09.499Z","dateModified":"2026-06-22T18:33:23.109Z","description":"A PHP internals mailing list thread discussing a proposed RFC to introduce a new `Time\\Duration` class in PHP 8.6. 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