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I need to create a DateTime object that represents the current time minus 15 minutes.

Will Curran
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  • Related question: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/100210/python-easy-way-to-add-n-seconds-to-a-datetime-time/100345#100345 – spade78 Dec 27 '10 at 20:43

9 Answers9

284

import datetime and then the magic timedelta stuff:

In [63]: datetime.datetime.now()
Out[63]: datetime.datetime(2010, 12, 27, 14, 39, 19, 700401)

In [64]: datetime.datetime.now() - datetime.timedelta(minutes=15)
Out[64]: datetime.datetime(2010, 12, 27, 14, 24, 21, 684435)
Spacedman
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    NB, in Python 3 you'll need to pass the timezone to `now()` to avoid an error about subtracting offset-naive and offset-aware datetimes: `datetime.datetime.now(datetime.timezone.utc)` – nornagon Dec 21 '17 at 20:18
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    @nornagon that’s not at all applicable here; it doesn’t matter if the datetime object is aware or naive, subtracting a timedelta works regardless. – Martijn Pieters Jan 29 '20 at 00:32
41
 datetime.datetime.now() - datetime.timedelta(minutes=15)
eduffy
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13

This is simply what to do:

datetime.datetime.now() - datetime.timedelta(minutes = 15)

timedeltas are specifically designed to allow you to subtract or add deltas (differences) to datetimes.

11
import datetime 
datetime.datetime.now() - datetime.timedelta(0, 900)

Actually 900 is in seconds. Which is equal to 15 minutes. `15*60 = 900`
pyeR_biz
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Tauquir
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  • Your import doesn’t match the code; you import `timedelta` but then use `datetime` attributes. Either import the module, or add the type. – Martijn Pieters Jan 29 '20 at 00:30
9

I have provide two methods for doing so for minutes as well as for years and hours if you want to see more examples:

import datetime
print(datetime.datetime.now())
print(datetime.datetime.now() - datetime.timedelta(minutes = 15))
print(datetime.datetime.now() + datetime.timedelta(minutes = -15))
print(datetime.timedelta(hours = 5))
print(datetime.datetime.now() + datetime.timedelta(days = 3))
print(datetime.datetime.now() + datetime.timedelta(days = -9))
print(datetime.datetime.now() - datetime.timedelta(days = 9))

I get the following results:

2016-06-03 16:04:03.706615
2016-06-03 15:49:03.706622
2016-06-03 15:49:03.706642
5:00:00
2016-06-06 16:04:03.706665
2016-05-25 16:04:03.706676
2016-05-25 16:04:03.706687
2016-06-03
16:04:03.706716
Mona Jalal
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7

Use DateTime in addition to a timedelta object http://docs.python.org/library/datetime.html

datetime.datetime.now()-datetime.timedelta(minutes=15)

Hut8
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7

only the below code in Python 3.7 worked for me 

from datetime import datetime,timedelta    
print(datetime.now()-timedelta(seconds=900))
Anandkumar
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4

datetime.datetime.now() - datetime.timedelta(0, 15 * 60)

timedelta is a "change in time". It takes days as the first parameter and seconds in the second parameter. 15 * 60 seconds is 15 minutes.

Donald Miner
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2

If you are using time.time() and wants timestamp as output

Simply use

CONSTANT_SECONDS = 900 # time  in seconds (900 seconds = 15 min)

current_time = int(time.time())
time_before_15_min = current_time - CONSTANT_SECONDS

You can change 900 seconds as per your required time.

vivek dhamecha
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