What are SimpleDateFormat Format Codes in Java?

The java.text.SimpleDateFormat class is used to format and parse a string to date and date to string.

Parsing a date string

One of the constructors of this class accepts a String value representing the desired date format and creates SimpleDateFormat object. To parse/convert a string as a Date object

• Instantiate this class by passing desired format string.
• Parse the date string using the parse() method.

Following is the list of letters for formatting with their descriptions and examples −

Example

import java.text.ParseException;
import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
import java.util.Date;
public class Sample {
   public static void main(String args[]) throws ParseException {  
      SimpleDateFormat formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy/dd/MM");      
      Date date = formatter.parse("2007/25/06");
      System.out.println("Date value: "+date);    
      formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("y:G");      
      date = formatter.parse("1920:BC");
      System.out.println("Date value: "+date);    
      formatter = new SimpleDateFormat("D-M-Y");      
      date = formatter.parse("25-05-1989");
      System.out.println("Date value: "+date);
   }
}

Output

Date value: Mon Jun 25 00:00:00 IST 2007
Date value: Sun Jan 01 00:00:00 IST 1920
Date value: Sun Jan 01 00:00:00 IST 1989

Example

import java.text.ParseException;
import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
import java.util.Date;
public class Sample {
   public static void main(String args[]) throws ParseException {  
      SimpleDateFormat formatter1 = new SimpleDateFormat("HH:mm:ss");      
      Date time1 = formatter1.parse("07:25:30");
      System.out.println("Date value: "+time1);    
      SimpleDateFormat formatter2 = new SimpleDateFormat("EEE:MMM-d:YYYY");      
      Date time2 = formatter2.parse("Sun:Jan-8:2018");
      System.out.println("Date value: "+time2);    
      SimpleDateFormat formatter3 = new SimpleDateFormat("hh 'o''clock' a");      
      Date time3 = formatter3.parse("09 o'clock AM");
      System.out.println("Date value: "+time3);
   }
}

Output

Date value: Thu Jan 01 07:25:30 IST 1970
Date value: Sun Dec 31 00:00:00 IST 2017
Date value: Thu Jan 01 09:00:00 IST 1970