How to format dates inside text views

Paul Hudson @twostraws December 1st 2022

Updated for Xcode 16.4

SwiftUI’s text views come with two specific date formatters to make dates look better on screen: one to handle single dates, and one to handle date ranges.

The date range version is actually simpler, because you just provide a closed date range and it will make sure it’s formatted appropriately according to the user’s locale:

Text(Date.now...Date.now.addingTimeInterval(600))

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The text “2:37–2:47 PM”

For example, that might show “10:30AM-10:40AM”.

When working with single dates, you should provide a style parameter to accompany it to determine how the date should be formatted. Here are some options:

VStack {
    // show just the date
    Text(Date.now.addingTimeInterval(600), style: .date)

    // show just the time
    Text(Date.now.addingTimeInterval(600), style: .time)

    // show the relative distance from now, automatically updating
    Text(Date.now.addingTimeInterval(600), style: .relative)

    // make a timer style, automatically updating
    Text(Date.now.addingTimeInterval(600), style: .timer)
}

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The lines “June 29, 2021” and “2:49 PM”, as well as two lines counting down from 10 minutes reading “8 min, 14 sec”, and “8:14” respectively.