How do I get the Current Date in JavaScript?

Matthew C.

The Problem

You want to get the current date in JavaScript, for example, to add a date stamp to your blog post or to blog post comments. How do you get the current date in JavaScript?

The Solution

Create a timestamp using the Date.now() method. This represents the number of milliseconds elapsed since 1 January 1970 00:00:00 UTC (ECMAScript epoch), with leap seconds ignored:

const currentTime = Date.now();
console.log(currentTime); // 1669634159760
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For example, you can create and save the timestamp when a blog post or comment is added to your database. When you want to display the date, you can convert the timestamp to a date and format it as needed. The .toString() method on the Date object returns a string representation of the date and time in the user’s timezone:

const dateToShow = new Date(currentTime);
console.log(dateToShow.toString()); // Mon Nov 28 2022 13:15:59 GMT+0200 (South Africa Standard Time)
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You can also create a new Date object, which represents a single moment in time, and save the date as a UTC timezone timestamp:

const currentTime = new Date();
console.log(currentTime.toUTCString()); // Mon, 28 Nov 2022 11:24:21 GMT
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You can then convert the timestamp to a date and format it as needed:

const dateToShow = new Date(currentTime);
console.log(dateToShow.toString()); // Mon Nov 28 2022 13:24:21 GMT+0200 (South Africa Standard Time)
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You can format the date using one of the various formatting methods on the Date object, such as .toString(), as described in our answer to the following question: How do I Format a Date in JavaScript?.