gmdate(): GMT/UTC date/time date and time in input format

gmdate($date_format,$timestamp);

Parameter	DESCRIPTION
$date_format	Required : Format required for output. Details are below.
$timestamp	Optional: Unix timestamp

Output is the Greenwich Mean Time - GMT date and time string displaying as per the input format.

Functionality of gmdate() is same as date() function

Difference in output between date() and gmdate()

Format	date()	gmdate()
'd/m/y H:i:s'	21/11/25 04:47:59	21/11/25 04:47:59
'F j, Y, g:i a'	November 21, 2025, 4:47 am	November 21, 2025, 4:47 am

date_default_timezone_set ("Asia/Kolkata");
$date1=gmdate("M d Y H:i:s") ; // current date and time 
echo $date1;
echo "<br>";
$date2=gmdate("M d Y H:i:s",mktime(23, 58, 59, 12, 25, 2023)) ; 
echo $date2;

Output is here ( refresh the page to check the changes )

Nov 21 2025 04:47:59
Dec 25 2023 18:28:59

Formats

Type	Ch	DESCRIPTION
Date	d	day of the month, 2 digits with leading zeros; i.e. '01' to '31'
	j	day of the month without leading zeros; i.e. '1' to '31'
Day	D	day of the week, textual, 3 letters; i.e. 'Fri'
	l	day of the week, textual, long; i.e. 'Saturday'
	w	day of the week, numeric, i.e. '0' (Sunday) to '6' (Saturday)
	z	day of the year; i.e. '0' to '365'
	r	RFC 822 formatted date; i.e. 'Thu, 21 Dec 2000 16:01:07 +0200' (added in PHP 4.0.4)
	S	Suffix for day of the month in 2 chrs ( with j )
	z	Day of the year ( from 0 to 365 )
Month	m	month; With leading zeros; i.e. '01' to '12'
	n	month without leading zeros; i.e. '1' to '12'
	M	month, textual, 3 letters; i.e. 'Jan'
	F	month, textual, long; i.e. 'January'
	t	Number of days in the month ( 28 to 31 )
Year	L	1 for Leap year, 0 if not
	o	ISO-8601 week-numbering year.
	Y	year, 4 digits; i.e. '2018'
	y	year, 2 digits; i.e. '19'
Time
Hour	g	hour, 12-hour format without leading zeros; i.e. '1' to '12'
	G	hour, 24-hour format without leading zeros; i.e. '0' to '23'
	h	hour, 12-hour format; i.e. '01' to '12'
	H	hour, 24-hour format; i.e. '00' to '23'
Minutes	i	minutes; i.e. '00' to '59'
Seconds	s	seconds; i.e. '00' to '59'
	a	'am' or 'pm'
	A	'AM' or 'PM'
	B	Swatch Internet time
	I	'1' if Daylight Savings Time, '0' otherwise.
	L	boolean for whether it is a leap year; i.e. '0' or '1'
	T	Timezone setting of this machine; i.e. 'MDT'
	U	seconds since the epoch
	Z	timezone offset in seconds (i.e. '-43200' to '43200'). The offset for timezones west of UTC is always negative, and for those east of UTC is always positive.
	e, O, P and T	timezone identifier ( e ) , difference in Hour and minutes to GMT (O),+- Hour : Minute (P), Short name of zone ( IST) (T)

PHP Date Functions Date Difference Unix timestamp for a GMT date

Subhendu Mohapatra

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gmdate(): GMT/UTC date and time

Difference in output between date() and gmdate()

Subhendu Mohapatra