How to parse month full form string using DateFormat in Java?

Question

I tried this:

DateFormat fmt = new SimpleDateFormat("MMMM dd, yyyy");
Date d = fmt.parse("June 27, 2007");

error:

Exception in thread "main" java.text.ParseException: Unparseable date: "June 27, 2007"

The java docs say I should use four characters to match the full form. I'm only able to use MMM successfully with abbreviated months like "Jun" but i need to match full form.

Text: For formatting, if the number of pattern letters is 4 or more, the full form is used; otherwise a short or abbreviated form is used if available. For parsing, both forms are accepted, independent of the number of pattern letters.

https://docs.oracle.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/text/SimpleDateFormat.html

Are you sure you're using Java 6? Those two lines of code you pasted is working fine for me; no exceptions. — aberrant80
– aberrant80, Commented Feb 8, 2010 at 1:39
For late-comers to this question I recommend you don’t use DateFormat, SimpleDateFormat and Date. Those classes are notoriously troublesome and long outdated. Instead use LocalDate and DateTimeFormatter, both from java.time, the modern Java date and time API. — Anonymous
– Anonymous, Commented Feb 13, 2021 at 9:09

BalusC · Accepted Answer · 2010-02-08 02:53:44Z

158

You are probably using a locale where the month names are not "January", "February", etc. but some other words in your local language.

Try specifying the locale you wish to use, for example Locale.US:

DateFormat fmt = new SimpleDateFormat("MMMM dd, yyyy", Locale.US);
Date d = fmt.parse("June 27,  2007");

Also, you have an extra space in the date string, but actually this has no effect on the result. It works either way.

edited Feb 8, 2010 at 2:53

BalusC

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answered Feb 8, 2010 at 1:43

Mark Byers

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3 Comments

Humphrey Bogart Over a year ago

so does the extra space have some influence in the parse error?

Mark Byers Over a year ago

@Beau Martínez: No, that has no effect whatsoever. I've updated my comment to address that point since it has been brought up not just by you, but by others in the comments too.

Debasish Ghosh Over a year ago

DateFormat fmt = new SimpleDateFormat("MMMM dd, yyyy", Locale.US); Date d = fmt.parse("Sat, June 27"); In my case its saying: java.text.ParseException: Unparseable date: "Sat, May 12"

Anonymous · Accepted Answer · 2021-02-13 14:49:17Z

LocalDate from java.time

Use LocalDate from java.time, the modern Java date and time API, for a date

    DateTimeFormatter dateFormatter = DateTimeFormatter.ofPattern("MMMM d, u", Locale.ENGLISH);
    LocalDate date = LocalDate.parse("June 27, 2007", dateFormatter);
    System.out.println(date);

Output:

2007-06-27

As others have said already, remember to specify an English-speaking locale when your string is in English. A LocalDate is a date without time of day, so a lot better suitable for the date from your string than the old Date class. Despite its name a Date does not represent a date but a point in time that falls on at least two different dates in different time zones of the world.

Only if you need an old-fashioned Date for an API that you cannot afford to upgrade to java.time just now, convert like this:

    Instant startOfDay = date.atStartOfDay(ZoneId.systemDefault()).toInstant();
    Date oldfashionedDate = Date.from(startOfDay);
    System.out.println(oldfashionedDate);

Output in my time zone:

Wed Jun 27 00:00:00 CEST 2007

Link

Oracle tutorial: Date Time explaining how to use java.time.

gkephorus · Accepted Answer · 2015-03-12 13:41:26Z

8

Just to top this up to the new Java 8 API:

DateTimeFormatter formatter = new DateTimeFormatterBuilder().appendPattern("MMMM dd, yyyy").toFormatter();
TemporalAccessor ta = formatter.parse("June 27, 2007");
Instant instant = LocalDate.from(ta).atStartOfDay().atZone(ZoneId.systemDefault()).toInstant();
Date d = Date.from(instant);
assertThat(d.getYear(), is(107));
assertThat(d.getMonth(), is(5));

A bit more verbose but you also see that the methods of Date used are deprecated ;-) Time to move on.

answered Mar 12, 2015 at 13:41

gkephorus

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3 Comments

Anonymous Over a year ago

Thanks for showing the recommended, modern way (+1). A detail, the TemporalAccessor interface is considered low-level and is not for everyday use. It’s better to parse directly into a LocalDate as shown for example in my answer. Also you are not addressing the locale problem behind the question.

bloub Over a year ago

I code this error when running your exact code : Exception in thread "main" java.time.format.DateTimeParseException: Text 'June 27, 2007' could not be parsed at index 0

gkephorus Over a year ago

I expect this to be due to the Locale you use. The code is expecting a Locale that does not know 'June' to be a month-name. (Same as with Mark Byers answer but than for Java 8 ;-) )

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