DateTime::setTimezone

(PHP 5 >= 5.2.0)

DateTime::setTimezone — Sets the time zone for the DateTime object

Description

public DateTime DateTime::setTimezone ( DateTimeZone $timezone )

DateTime date_timezone_set ( DateTime $object , DateTimeZone $timezone )

Parameters

object: Procedural style only: A DateTime object returned by date_create()
timezone: Desired time zone.

Return Values

Returns the modified DateTime.

Changelog

Version	Description
5.3.0	Changed the return value from `NULL` to DateTime.

Examples

Example #1 Setting and getting DateTimeZone objects


<?php
date_default_timezone_set('Europe/London');

$datetime = new DateTime('2008-08-03 12:35:23');
echo $datetime->getTimezone()->getName() . "\n";

$datetime = new DateTime('2008-08-03 12:35:23');
$la_time = new DateTimeZone('America/Los_Angeles');
$datetime->setTimezone($la_time);
echo $datetime->getTimezone()->getName();
?>

The above example will output:

Europe/London
America/Los_Angeles


The timestamp value represented by the DateTime object is not modified when you set the timezone using this method.  Only the timezone, and thus the resulting display formatting, is affected.



This can be seen using the following test code:

<?php

$MNTTZ = new DateTimeZone('America/Denver');

$ESTTZ = new DateTimeZone('America/New_York');



$dt = new DateTime('11/24/2009 2:00 pm', $MNTTZ);

var_dump($dt->format(DATE_RFC822), $dt->format('U'));

$dt->setTimezone($ESTTZ);

var_dump($dt->format(DATE_RFC822), $dt->format('U'));



/** Output:

string(29) "Tue, 24 Nov 09 14:00:00 -0700"

string(10) "1259096400"

string(29) "Tue, 24 Nov 09 16:00:00 -0500"

string(10) "1259096400"

**/

?>



As such, you can use this to easily convert between timezones for display purposes.

dan dot morin at gmail dot com
25-Jun-2009 07:56


In my setup setTimezone() does modify the date, as well as the TZ. 





Code:





<?php


$dt_obj = new DateTime('2009-06-25 12:00:00');


echo $dt_obj->format(DATE_RFC822) . "\n";


$dt_obj->setTimezone(new DateTimeZone('GMT'));


echo $dt_obj->format(DATE_RFC822);


?>





Output:


Thu, 25 Jun 09 12:00:00 -0400


Thu, 25 Jun 09 16:00:00 +0000

sht dot alien at gmx dot net
16-Jun-2009 04:13


Btw: setTimezone() does NOT modify the date, just the TZ. I tested this just to make sure 'cause the documentation doesn't tell.

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Last updated: Fri, 11 Dec 2009