Calculating days between two dates with Java

Question

I want a Java program that calculates days between two dates.

1. Type the first date (German notation; with whitespaces: \"dd mm yyyy\")
2. Type the second

Answer 1

String dateStart = "01/14/2015 08:29:58";
String dateStop = "01/15/2015 11:31:48";

//HH converts hour in 24 hours format (0-23), day calculation
SimpleDateFormat format = new SimpleDateFormat("MM/dd/yyyy HH:mm:ss");

Date d1 = null;
Date d2 = null;

d1 = format.parse(dateStart);
d2 = format.parse(dateStop);

//in milliseconds
long diff = d2.getTime() - d1.getTime();

long diffSeconds = diff / 1000 % 60;
long diffMinutes = diff / (60 * 1000) % 60;
long diffHours = diff / (60 * 60 * 1000) % 24;
long diffDays = diff / (24 * 60 * 60 * 1000);

System.out.print(diffDays + " days, ");
System.out.print(diffHours + " hours, ");
System.out.print(diffMinutes + " minutes, ");
System.out.print(diffSeconds + " seconds.");

Answer 2

When I run your program, it doesn't even get me to the point where I can enter the second date.

This is simpler and less error prone.

import java.io.BufferedReader;
import java.io.InputStreamReader;
import java.text.SimpleDateFormat;
import java.util.Date;

public class Test001 {

    public static void main(String[] args) throws Exception {

        BufferedReader br = null;

        br = new BufferedReader(new InputStreamReader(System.in));
        SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("dd MM yyyy");

        System.out.println("Insert first date : ");
        Date dt1 = sdf.parse(br.readLine().trim());

        System.out.println("Insert second date : ");
        Date dt2 = sdf.parse(br.readLine().trim());

        long diff = dt2.getTime() - dt1.getTime();

        System.out.println("Days: " + diff / 1000L / 60L / 60L / 24L);

        if (br != null) {
            br.close();
        }
    }
}

Answer 3

Java date libraries are notoriously broken. I would advise to use Joda Time. It will take care of leap year, time zone and so on for you.

Minimal working example:

import java.util.Scanner;
import org.joda.time.DateTime;
import org.joda.time.Days;
import org.joda.time.LocalDate;
import org.joda.time.format.DateTimeFormat;
import org.joda.time.format.DateTimeFormatter;

public class DateTestCase {

    public static void main(String[] args) {

        System.out.print("Insert first date: ");
        Scanner s = new Scanner(System.in);
        String firstdate = s.nextLine();
        System.out.print("Insert second date: ");
        String seconddate = s.nextLine();

        // Formatter
        DateTimeFormatter dateStringFormat = DateTimeFormat
                .forPattern("dd MM yyyy");
        DateTime firstTime = dateStringFormat.parseDateTime(firstdate);
        DateTime secondTime = dateStringFormat.parseDateTime(seconddate);
        int days = Days.daysBetween(new LocalDate(firstTime),
                                    new LocalDate(secondTime)).getDays();
        System.out.println("Days between the two dates " + days);
    }
}

Answer 4

Most / all answers caused issues for us when daylight savings time came around. Here's our working solution for all dates, without using JodaTime. It utilizes calendar objects:

public static int daysBetween(Calendar day1, Calendar day2){
    Calendar dayOne = (Calendar) day1.clone(),
            dayTwo = (Calendar) day2.clone();

    if (dayOne.get(Calendar.YEAR) == dayTwo.get(Calendar.YEAR)) {
        return Math.abs(dayOne.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_YEAR) - dayTwo.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_YEAR));
    } else {
        if (dayTwo.get(Calendar.YEAR) > dayOne.get(Calendar.YEAR)) {
            //swap them
            Calendar temp = dayOne;
            dayOne = dayTwo;
            dayTwo = temp;
        }
        int extraDays = 0;

        int dayOneOriginalYearDays = dayOne.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_YEAR);

        while (dayOne.get(Calendar.YEAR) > dayTwo.get(Calendar.YEAR)) {
            dayOne.add(Calendar.YEAR, -1);
            // getActualMaximum() important for leap years
            extraDays += dayOne.getActualMaximum(Calendar.DAY_OF_YEAR);
        }

        return extraDays - dayTwo.get(Calendar.DAY_OF_YEAR) + dayOneOriginalYearDays ;
    }
}

Answer 5

Simplest way:

public static long getDifferenceDays(Date d1, Date d2) {
    long diff = d2.getTime() - d1.getTime();
    return TimeUnit.DAYS.convert(diff, TimeUnit.MILLISECONDS);
}

Answer 6

Use:

public int getDifferenceDays(Date d1, Date d2) {
    int daysdiff = 0;
    long diff = d2.getTime() - d1.getTime();
    long diffDays = diff / (24 * 60 * 60 * 1000) + 1;
    daysdiff = (int) diffDays;
    return daysdiff;
}