Date math on Wikipedia is done with variables, templates and the #time parser function.
In articles, it is almost always preferred to specify a specific static date for a statement or event rather than an automatically generated date. Wikipedia:As of describes how to properly specify such dates.
Current date and time
| Built-in variables
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Templates based on them
|
What you see
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Comments
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| {{CURRENTTIMESTAMP}}
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20241109073812
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| {{CURRENTYEAR}}
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2024
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| {{UTC}}
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2024-11-09 07:38 UTC
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also uses {{CURRENTMONTH}} {{CURRENTDAY2}} {{CURRENTTIME}}
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| {{CURRENTDATE}}
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07:38, Saturday, November 9, 2024 (UTC)
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also uses {{CURRENTTIME}} {{CURRENTDAYNAME}} {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}} {{CURRENTDAY}}
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| {{CURRENTJULIANDAY}}
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2460623.8181944
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current Julian day also uses {{CURRENTMONTH}} {{CURRENTDAY}} {{CURRENTHOUR}} {{CURRENTMINUTE}} {{CURRENTSECOND}}
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| {{CURRENTMONTH}}
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|
11
|
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| {{CURRENTMNTH}}
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11
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trims leading zero
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| {{CURRENTMONTHNAME}}
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November
|
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| {{Month+1}}
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December
|
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| {{Month-1}}
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October
|
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| {{Month-2}}
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September
|
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| {{CURRENTDAY}}
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9
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day of month
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| {{CURRENTDOW}}
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6
|
day of week
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| {{#time:l|-1 day}}
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Friday
|
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| {{#time:l}}
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Saturday
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| {{#time:l|+1 day}}
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Sunday
|
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| Any variable or template with a resolution of smaller than one day should not be placed in articles. These variables only indicate when the article was parsed and cached; they may lag by many hours or even days compared to the time the page is viewed.
|
| {{CURRENTTIME}}
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07:38
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| {{CURRENTHOUR}}
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07
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| {{#time:H|+1 hour}}
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08
|
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| {{Current hour}}
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7
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trims leading zero
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| {{#time:i}}
|
|
38
|
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| {{CURRENTMINUTE}}
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38
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| {{Current minute}}
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38
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trims leading zero
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| {{#time:s}}
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|
12
|
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| {{CURRENTSECOND}}
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12
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Computed date and time
| Template name
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Usage
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Output
|
Comment
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| {{Ordinal date}}
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{{Ordinal date|year=2007|month=03|day=15}}
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74
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returns ordinal date (day of year)
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| {{Ordinal date|year=2008|month=03|day=15}}
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75
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+1 due to leap year in 2008
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| {{WEEKDAY}}
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{{WEEKDAY|2009|08|25}}
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1
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returns day of week
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| {{WEEKDAYNAME|{{WEEKDAY|2009|08|25}}}}
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Tuesday
|
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| {{JULIANDAY}}
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{{JULIANDAY|2009|08|25}}
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2455069
|
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| {{WEEKDAYNAME|{{JULIANDAY|2009|08|25}}}}
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Tuesday
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Note: 2455069 mod 7 = 1
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| {{JULIANDAY|{{CURRENTYEAR}}|{{CURRENTMONTH}}|{{CURRENTDAY}}}}
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2460624
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Nesting templates to get the value of the current Julian day with no decimal portion. Useful for date math between a set point and the current date.
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| {{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP}}
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{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP|2455069}}
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20090825120000
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same format as {{CURRENTTIMESTAMP}}
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| {{#time:D Y-m-d|{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP|2455069}}}}
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Tue 2009-08-25
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Julian dates or day numbers can be used for date calculations. A simple example follows:
- 90 days from 25 December 2006 is: 25 March 2007
- Code: {{#time:j F Y|{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP|{{JULIANDAY|2006|12|25}}+90}}}}
- 90 days from 25 December 2007 is: 24 March 2008 (1 day less than first example due to leap year in 2008)
- Code: {{#time:j F Y|{{JULIANDAY.TIMESTAMP|{{JULIANDAY|2007|12|25}}+90}}}}
Fancy stuff
See also