fromisoformat(): parses a date or datetime string in ISO 8601 format

Today's date

from datetime import date
dt = date.fromisoformat(date.today().strftime('%Y-%m-%d'))
print(dt)

2019-09-17

from datetime import date
dt = date.fromisoformat('2019-09-22')
print(dt)

2019-09-22

from datetime import date
try:
    dt = date.fromisoformat('2019-02-30')  # Invalid date
except ValueError as e:
    print(f"Error: {e}")

Error: day is out of range for month

Difference between fromisoformat() and strptime()

fromisoformat(): A simple, direct method to parse ISO date strings in the YYYY-MM-DD format. It's faster and requires no format specification.

strptime(): More versatile but requires a format string to define the structure of the input. It’s useful for parsing dates in various formats.

from datetime import date, datetime

# Using fromisoformat
print(date.fromisoformat('2023-09-12'))

# Using strptime for the same result
print(datetime.strptime('2023-09-12', '%Y-%m-%d').date())

2023-09-12
2023-09-12

fromisoformat() is simpler when handling standard ISO dates, while strptime() is needed for more complex formats.

Subhendu Mohapatra

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