why does DateTime.ToString("dd/MM/yyyy") give me dd-MM-yyyy?

Question

I want my datetime to be converted to a string that is in format "dd/MM/yyyy"

Whenever I convert it using DateTime.ToString("dd/MM/yyyy"), I get dd-MM-yyyy instead.

Is there some sort of culture info that I have to set?

I did that, it didn't work, the problem isn't the dates, it's the "-", I want it to be a "/" like I've specified — Diskdrive, Jun 14 '11 at 12:17
use MM rather than mm - mm represents minutes and not months. — Lloyd Powell, Jun 14 '11 at 12:30
possible duplicate of [How to format a date with slashes in C#](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/3684033/how-to-format-a-date-with-slashes-in-c-sharp) — Dzyann, Jul 29 '15 at 13:44
The [MSDN documentation for DateTime.ToString](https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/zdtaw1bw(v=vs.110).aspx#Anchor_2) is hopelessly wrong: "*For example, the “MM/dd/yyyyHH:mm” format string displays the date and time string in a fixed format ... The format string uses “/” as a fixed date separator regardless of culture-specific settings.*" — Colonel Panic, Nov 22 '16 at 12:30

score 262 · Accepted Answer · edited Jan 30 '14 at 07:03

262

Slash is a date delimiter, so that will use the current culture date delimiter.

If you want to hard-code it to always use slash, you can do something like this:

DateTime.ToString("dd'/'MM'/'yyyy")

edited Jan 30 '14 at 07:03

shashwat

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answered Jun 14 '11 at 12:17

Bojan Bjelic

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@spender - in some cultures they are. – Daniel A. White Jun 14 '11 at 12:19
6

You could also use this format: dateTime.ToString(@"yyyy\/MM\/dd") – base2 Nov 26 '12 at 15:22
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MSDN reference: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/8kb3ddd4.aspx#dateSeparator – russau Jun 18 '13 at 16:50
@DanielA.White There are countries that have more lefties than right handers ? I mean when I think about a slash with a sword (right hander normal) it makes a `/` :) – Bitterblue Mar 07 '14 at 08:46
Another method I've encountered is : `string.Format("{0:dd/MM/yyyy}", DateTime.Now)` Only problem is that it doesn't always work. Worth trying though – Yanker Dec 17 '14 at 10:02
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Escaping the format string using backslash does also work: DateTime.Now.ToString("dd\\/MM\\/yyyy"); – TomB Jan 30 '15 at 08:42
Life saving solution – Amit Bisht Dec 29 '16 at 08:13

Liu Peng · Answer 2 · 2014-02-28T03:15:40.870

76

Pass CultureInfo.InvariantCulture as the second parameter of DateTime, it will return the string as what you want, even a very special format:

DateTime.Now.ToString("dd|MM|yyyy", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture)

will return: 28|02|2014

edited Feb 28 '14 at 03:15

answered Feb 28 '14 at 02:59

Liu Peng

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This code is more clear, than in accepted answer (I mean added CultureInfo). It looks at least better than escaping slashes by apostrophes. – Sergey Jun 22 '16 at 15:09
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Definitely easier to read than using escape characters. I'm a bit shocked that I didn't know the whole time that my date formats were going to get overwritten! – Savage Jul 28 '16 at 14:09

Mikael Engver · Answer 3 · 2017-01-26T13:20:17.970

14

Add CultureInfo.InvariantCulture as an argument:

using System.Globalization;

...

var dateTime = new DateTime(2016,8,16);
dateTime.ToString("dd/MM/yyyy", CultureInfo.InvariantCulture);

Will return:

"16/08/2016"

edited Jan 26 '17 at 13:20

answered Sep 27 '16 at 21:11

Mikael Engver

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if the developer uses tostring method with some letters like M m ss etc. will get wrong result with your solution for example Datetime.Now.ToString("yyyy/dd/mm/Month",CultureInfo.InvariantCulture) will not result 2017/01/02/Month it will result 2017/01/02/2onth – Okan SARICA Nov 13 '17 at 17:22
@OkanSARICA if you would want to suffix the date with ”/Month” you should do it after the ToString method instead. DateTime.Now.ToString(”yyyy/MM/dd”, CultureInfo.InvariantCulture) + ”/Month”; – Mikael Engver Nov 15 '17 at 08:09

score 1 · Answer 4 · answered Dec 28 '18 at 23:00

1

If you use MVC, tables, it works like this:

<td>@(((DateTime)detalle.fec).ToString("dd'/'MM'/'yyyy"))</td>

answered Dec 28 '18 at 23:00

score 0 · Answer 5 · answered Dec 28 '22 at 14:27

Try this.

 @foreach (DataRow _Row in CashBook2.Rows)
            {
                <tr>
                    <td>@DateTime.Parse(_Row["Vou_Date"].ToString()).ToString(DateFormat)</td>
                    <td>@_Row["Vou_No"].ToString()</td>
                    <td>@_Row["Description"].ToString()</td>
                    <td>@decimal.Parse(_Row["DR"].ToString()).ToString(NumFormat)</td>
                    <td>@decimal.Parse(_Row["CR"].ToString()).ToString(NumFormat)</td>
                    <td>@Balance</td>
                </tr>
            }

please provide some context for the code – PawZaw Dec 28 '22 at 14:49 — PawZaw, Dec 28 '22 at 14:49

score -3 · Answer 6 · answered Jun 14 '11 at 12:16

Dumb question/answer perhaps, but have you tried dd/MM/yyyy? Note the capitalization.

mm is for minutes with a leading zero. So I doubt that's what you want.

This may be helpful: http://www.geekzilla.co.uk/View00FF7904-B510-468C-A2C8-F859AA20581F.htm

why does DateTime.ToString("dd/MM/yyyy") give me dd-MM-yyyy?

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