Paste a Unix timestamp from a log, a database or an API to see the date in UTC and in any time zone, or pick a date to get its timestamp. The converter recognises seconds, milliseconds, microseconds and nanoseconds by their length, and the live counter shows the current Unix time.
Table of Contents
What a Unix timestamp is
A Unix timestamp counts the seconds since 1 January 1970 at 00:00:00 UTC. It is the same number everywhere in the world, so it is the safest way to store a moment; the time zone only matters when you display it.
Seconds, milliseconds and microseconds
Linux tools, PHP and MySQL use seconds (10 digits today). JavaScript and Java use milliseconds (13 digits), and some databases and logs use microseconds (16 digits) or nanoseconds (19 digits). If a date comes out in the year 50,000 or in 1970, the unit is probably wrong.
The year 2038 problem
Software that stores timestamps as signed 32-bit integers runs out at 03:14:07 UTC on 19 January 2038. Modern 64-bit Linux and PHP are not affected, but old embedded devices and some database columns are; MySQL’s TIMESTAMP type ends in 2038, while MariaDB 11.5 and later extend it to 2106 on 64-bit systems.
Unix Timestamp Converter at a glance
Official documentation: time(7) Linux manual, PHP date().
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Frequently asked questions
Does a Unix timestamp include the time zone?
No. It always counts from midnight UTC on 1 January 1970, so the same timestamp is the same moment everywhere. Convert it to a zone only for display.
Are leap seconds counted?
No. Unix time treats every day as exactly 86,400 seconds, so leap seconds are not counted and systems smooth or repeat a second instead.
Can a timestamp be negative?
Yes. Negative numbers are dates before 1970, for example -86400 is 31 December 1969.