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datetime.today() with time != datetime.now() with time? [duplicate]

>>> import pytz
>>> pytz.timezone('Asia/Hong_Kong')
<DstTzInfo 'Asia/Hong_Kong' LMT+7:37:00 STD>
A seven hour and 37 minute offset? This is a little strange, does anyone experience the same issue?
In fact I'm getting different behavior between
import pytz
from datetime import datetime
hk = pytz.timezone('Asia/Hong_Kong')
dt1 = datetime(2012,1,1,tzinfo=hk)
dt2 = hk.localize(datetime(2012,1,1))
if dt1 > dt2:
print "Why?"

Time zones and offsets change over the years. The default zone name and offset delivered when pytz creates a timezone object are the earliest ones available for that zone, and sometimes they can seem kind of strange. When you use localize to attach the zone to a date, the proper zone name and offset are substituted. Simply using the datetime constructor to attach the zone to the date doesn't allow it to adjust properly.

While I'm sure historic changes in timezones are a factor, passing pytz timezone object to the DateTime constructor results in odd behavior even for timezones that have experienced no changes since their inception.
import datetime
import pytz
dt = datetime.datetime(2020, 7, 15, 0, 0, tzinfo= pytz.timezone('US/Eastern'))
produces
2020-07-15 00:00:00-04:56
Creating the datetime object then localizing it produced expected results
import datetime
import pytz
dt = datetime.datetime(2020, 7, 15, 0, 0)
dt_local = timezone('US/Eastern').localize(dt)
produces
2020-07-15 00:00:00-04:00

Coming here nearly 10 years later, I think it's worth a note that we can now exclusively utilize the Python 3.9+ standard library to handle time zones, without a "localize trap".
Use the zoneinfo module to set and replace the tzinfo however you like, ex:
from datetime import datetime
from zoneinfo import ZoneInfo
hk = ZoneInfo('Asia/Hong_Kong')
print(repr(hk))
# zoneinfo.ZoneInfo(key='Asia/Hong_Kong')
dt1 = datetime(2012,1,1,tzinfo=hk)
print(dt1)
# 2012-01-01 00:00:00+08:00
there is a deprecation shim for pytz
Alternatives, if you're not able to use zoneinfo:
for Python < 3.9, there's backports.zoneinfo
you could also use dateutil, which follows the same semantics as zoneinfo
Note for pandas users:
pandas (v1.4.1) is still using pytz internally, and seems to have some trouble with ZoneInfo timezone objects

unable to display time in different timezone

When I change tzinfo on an aware datetime instance I keep getting the same strftime result:
>>> from datetime import datetime
>>> import pytz
>>> fmt = '%d.%m.%Y %H:%M'
>>> now_naive = datetime.utcnow()
>>> now_naive.strftime(fmt)
'02.08.2017 11:53'
>>> now_aware = now_naive.replace(tzinfo=pytz.timezone('UTC'))
>>> now_aware_minus_3 = now_aware.replace(tzinfo=pytz.timezone('Etc/GMT-3'))
>>> now_aware.strftime(fmt)
'02.08.2017 11:53'
>>> now_aware_minus_3.strftime(fmt)
'02.08.2017 11:53'
Why is that? how do I display current time in different timezone?

Try it in this way :
from datetime import datetime
from pytz import timezone
x=datetime.now(timezone('Europe/Madrid'))
print x
x=datetime.now(timezone('UTC'))
print x
x=datetime.now(timezone('Etc/GMT-3'))
print x

Using .replace(tzinfo=...) only replaces the timezone in the datetime object, without performing an actual timezone conversion.
Try this instead:
time_unaware = datetime.utcnow()
time_utc = pytz.timezone('UTC').localize(time_unaware) # same as .replace(tzinfo=...)
time_gmt_minus_3 = time_utc.astimezone(pytz.timezone('Etc/GMT-3')) # performs timezone conversion
Using .strftime() on time_gmt_minus_3 should now show what you expected.
Also, #sophros has linked here:
In order to conform with the POSIX style, those zones beginning with "Etc/GMT" have their sign reversed from what most people expect. In this style, zones west of GMT have a positive sign and those east have a negative sign.

Specify which timezone a datetime is in, in python

I have a datetime that i get from a database, this datetime is a UTC datetime. But when i pull it from the DB, it is unaware of the timezone. What i need to do, is convert this datetime to a "seconds from epoch" time for another function. The problem with this, is that the system's time is in PST and i am not able to change it for specific reasons.
So, what i want to do is, take this datetime that i get from the database, and tell python that this datetime is a UTC datetime. Every way that i have done that, results in it losing time or gaining time due to timezone conversions. Again, not trying to convert the time, just trying to specify that it is UTC.
If anyone can help with this that would be great.
Thanks!
Example
Assume database_function() returns a datetime data type that is '2013-06-01 01:06:18'
datetime = database_function()
epoch = datetime.strftime('%s')
pytz.utc.localize(database_function()).datetime.strftime('%s')
datetime.replace(tzinfo=pytz.utc).datetime.strftime('%s')
Both of these return a epoch timestamp of 1370077578
But, it SHOULD return a timestamp of 1370048778 per http://www.epochconverter.com/
Remember, this timestamp is a utc timestamp

Using the fabolous pytz:
import datetime, pytz
dt = datetime.datetime(...)
utc_dt = pytz.utc.localize(dt)
This creates a tz-aware datetime object, in UTC.

How about Setting timezone in Python This appears to reset the timezone within your python script. You are changing the time zone that your system sees given the specified time, not changing the specified time into the specified time zone. You probably want to set it to 'UTC'
time.tzset()
Resets the time conversion rules used by the library routines.
The environment variable TZ specifies how this is done.
New in version 2.3.
Availability: Unix.
I do not have this available on my home platform so I could not test it. I had to get this from the previous answer.
The answer marked best on the question is:
>>> import os, time
>>> time.strftime('%X %x %Z')
'12:45:20 08/19/09 CDT'
>>> os.environ['TZ'] = 'Europe/London'
>>> time.tzset()
>>> time.strftime('%X %x %Z')
'18:45:39 08/19/09 BST'
To get the specific values you've listed:
>>> year = time.strftime('%Y')
>>> month = time.strftime('%m')
>>> day = time.strftime('%d')
>>> hour = time.strftime('%H')
>>> minute = time.strftime('%M')
See here for a complete list of directives. Keep in mind that the strftime() function will always return a string, not an integer or other type.

You can Use pytz, which is a time zone definitions package.
from datetime import datetime
from pytz import timezone
fmt = "%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S %Z%z"
# Current time in UTC
now_utc = datetime.now(timezone('UTC'))
print now_utc.strftime(fmt)
# Convert to US/Pacific time zone
now_pacific = now_utc.astimezone(timezone('US/Pacific'))
print now_pacific.strftime(fmt)
# Convert to Europe/Berlin time zone
now_berlin = now_pacific.astimezone(timezone('Europe/Berlin'))
print now_berlin.strftime(fmt)
output:
2014-04-04 21:50:55 UTC+0000
2014-04-04 14:50:55 PDT-0700
2014-04-04 23:50:55 CEST+0200
or may be it helps
>> import pytz
>>> import datetime
>>>
>>> now_utc = datetime.datetime.utcnow() #Our UTC naive time from DB,
for the time being here I'm taking it as current system UTC time..
>>> now_utc
datetime.datetime(2011, 5, 9, 6, 36, 39, 883479) # UTC time in Naive
form.
>>>
>>> local_tz = pytz.timezone('Europe/Paris') #Our Local timezone, to
which we want to convert the UTC time.
>>>
>>> now_utc = pytz.utc.localize(now_utc) #Add Timezone information to
UTC time.
>>>
>>> now_utc
datetime.datetime(2011, 5, 9, 6, 36, 39, 883479, tzinfo=<UTC>) # The
full datetime tuple
>>>
>>> local_time = now_utc.astimezone(local\_tz) # Convert to local
time.
>>>
>>> local_time #Current local time in Paris
datetime.datetime(2011, 5, 9, 8, 36, 39, 883479, tzinfo=<DstTzInfo
'Europe/Paris' CEST+2:00:00 DST>)

Here is one way, using the pytz module:
import pytz
utc_datetime = (datetime.datetime(1970, 1, 1, tzinfo=pytz.utc)
+ datetime.timedelta(seconds=seconds_since_epoch)
If you don't want to install the pytz module, you can copy the example UTC class from the datetime documentation (search for "class UTC"):
https://docs.python.org/2/library/datetime.html#tzinfo-objects

Here's stdlib only solution without 3-party modules.
.., this datetime is a UTC datetime. But when i pull it from the DB, it is unaware of the timezone. What i need to do, is convert this datetime to a "seconds from epoch" time for another function.emphasize is mine
To convert an unaware (naive) datetime object that represents time in UTC to POSIX timestamp:
from datetime import datetime
timestamp = (dt_from_db - datetime(1970, 1, 1)).total_seconds()
Example:
>>> from datetime import datetime
>>> dt = datetime.strptime('2013-06-01 01:06:18', '%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S')
>>> (dt - datetime(1970, 1, 1)).total_seconds()
1370048778.0
See Converting datetime.date to UTC timestamp in Python that provides solutions for various Python versions.
To answer the question from the title: In general you need pytz library to handle timezones in Python. In particular, you should use .localize method to convert an unaware datetime object into timezone-aware one.
import pytz # $ pip install pytz
from tzlocal import get_localzone # $ pip install tzlocal
tz = get_localzone() # local timezone whatever it is (just an example)
aware_dt = tz.localize(naive_dt_in_local_timezone, is_dst=None)
is_dst=None asserts that naive_dt_in_local_timezone exists and unambiguous.
Though you don't need it for UTC timezone because it always has the same UTC offset (zero) around the year and in all past years:
import pytz
aware_dt = utc_dt.replace(tzinfo=pytz.utc)
See Python - simplest and most coherent way to get timezone-aware current time in UTC? (it provides a stdlib-only solution):
aware_dt = utc_dt.replace(tzinfo=timezone.utc)

Python UTC datetime object's ISO format doesn't include Z (Zulu or Zero offset)

Why python 2.7 doesn't include Z character (Zulu or zero offset) at the end of UTC datetime object's isoformat string unlike JavaScript?
>>> datetime.datetime.utcnow().isoformat()
'2013-10-29T09:14:03.895210'
Whereas in javascript
>>> console.log(new Date().toISOString());
2013-10-29T09:38:41.341Z

Option: isoformat()
Python's datetime does not support the military timezone suffixes like 'Z' suffix for UTC. The following simple string replacement does the trick:
In [1]: import datetime
In [2]: d = datetime.datetime(2014, 12, 10, 12, 0, 0)
In [3]: str(d).replace('+00:00', 'Z')
Out[3]: '2014-12-10 12:00:00Z'
str(d) is essentially the same as d.isoformat(sep=' ')
See: Datetime, Python Standard Library
Option: strftime()
Or you could use strftime to achieve the same effect:
In [4]: d.strftime('%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ')
Out[4]: '2014-12-10T12:00:00Z'
Note: This option works only when you know the date specified is in UTC.
See: datetime.strftime()
Additional: Human Readable Timezone
Going further, you may be interested in displaying human readable timezone information, pytz with strftime %Z timezone flag:
In [5]: import pytz
In [6]: d = datetime.datetime(2014, 12, 10, 12, 0, 0, tzinfo=pytz.utc)
In [7]: d
Out[7]: datetime.datetime(2014, 12, 10, 12, 0, tzinfo=<UTC>)
In [8]: d.strftime('%Y-%m-%d %H:%M:%S %Z')
Out[8]: '2014-12-10 12:00:00 UTC'

Python datetime objects don't have time zone info by default, and without it, Python actually violates the ISO 8601 specification (if no time zone info is given, assumed to be local time). You can use the pytz package to get some default time zones, or directly subclass tzinfo yourself:
from datetime import datetime, tzinfo, timedelta
class simple_utc(tzinfo):
def tzname(self,**kwargs):
return "UTC"
def utcoffset(self, dt):
return timedelta(0)
Then you can manually add the time zone info to utcnow():
>>> datetime.utcnow().replace(tzinfo=simple_utc()).isoformat()
'2014-05-16T22:51:53.015001+00:00'
Note that this DOES conform to the ISO 8601 format, which allows for either Z or +00:00 as the suffix for UTC. Note that the latter actually conforms to the standard better, with how time zones are represented in general (UTC is a special case.)

Short answer
datetime.now(timezone.utc).isoformat().replace("+00:00", "Z")
Long answer
The reason that the "Z" is not included is because datetime.now() and even datetime.utcnow() return timezone naive datetimes, that is to say datetimes with no timezone information associated. To get a timezone aware datetime, you need to pass a timezone as an argument to datetime.now. For example:
from datetime import datetime, timezone
datetime.utcnow()
#> datetime.datetime(2020, 9, 3, 20, 58, 49, 22253)
# This is timezone naive
datetime.now(timezone.utc)
#> datetime.datetime(2020, 9, 3, 20, 58, 49, 22253, tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc)
# This is timezone aware
Once you have a timezone aware timestamp, isoformat will include a timezone designation. Thus, you can then get an ISO 8601 timestamp via:
datetime.now(timezone.utc).isoformat()
#> '2020-09-03T20:53:07.337670+00:00'
"+00:00" is a valid ISO 8601 timezone designation for UTC. If you want to have "Z" instead of "+00:00", you have to do the replacement yourself:
datetime.now(timezone.utc).isoformat().replace("+00:00", "Z")
#> '2020-09-03T20:53:07.337670Z'

The following javascript and python scripts give identical outputs. I think it's what you are looking for.
JavaScript
new Date().toISOString()
Python
from datetime import datetime
datetime.utcnow().isoformat()[:-3]+'Z'
The output they give is the UTC (zulu) time formatted as an ISO string with a 3 millisecond significant digit and appended with a Z.
2019-01-19T23:20:25.459Z

Your goal shouldn't be to add a Z character, it should be to generate a UTC "aware" datetime string in ISO 8601 format. The solution is to pass a UTC timezone object to datetime.now() instead of using datetime.utcnow():
from datetime import datetime, timezone
datetime.now(timezone.utc)
>>> datetime.datetime(2020, 1, 8, 6, 6, 24, 260810, tzinfo=datetime.timezone.utc)
datetime.now(timezone.utc).isoformat()
>>> '2020-01-08T06:07:04.492045+00:00'
That looks good, so let's see what Django and dateutil think:
from django.utils.timezone import is_aware
is_aware(datetime.now(timezone.utc))
>>> True
from dateutil.parser import isoparse
is_aware(isoparse(datetime.now(timezone.utc).isoformat()))
>>> True
Note that you need to use isoparse() from dateutil.parser because the Python documentation for datetime.fromisoformat() says it "does not support parsing arbitrary ISO 8601 strings".
Okay, the Python datetime object and the ISO 8601 string are both UTC "aware". Now let's look at what JavaScript thinks of the datetime string. Borrowing from this answer we get:
let date = '2020-01-08T06:07:04.492045+00:00';
const dateParsed = new Date(Date.parse(date))
document.write(dateParsed);
document.write("\n");
// Tue Jan 07 2020 22:07:04 GMT-0800 (Pacific Standard Time)
document.write(dateParsed.toISOString());
document.write("\n");
// 2020-01-08T06:07:04.492Z
document.write(dateParsed.toUTCString());
document.write("\n");
// Wed, 08 Jan 2020 06:07:04 GMT
Notes:
I approached this problem with a few goals:
generate a UTC "aware" datetime string in ISO 8601 format
use only Python Standard Library functions for datetime object and string creation
validate the datetime object and string with the Django timezone utility function, the dateutil parser and JavaScript functions
Note that this approach does not include a Z suffix and does not use utcnow(). But it's based on the recommendation in the Python documentation and it passes muster with both Django and JavaScript.
See also:
Stop using utcnow and utcfromtimestamp
What is the “right” JSON date format?

In Python >= 3.2 you can simply use this:
>>> from datetime import datetime, timezone
>>> datetime.now(timezone.utc).isoformat()
'2019-03-14T07:55:36.979511+00:00'

Python datetimes are a little clunky. Use arrow.
> str(arrow.utcnow())
'2014-05-17T01:18:47.944126+00:00'
Arrow has essentially the same api as datetime, but with timezones and some extra niceties that should be in the main library.
A format compatible with Javascript can be achieved by:
arrow.utcnow().isoformat().replace("+00:00", "Z")
'2018-11-30T02:46:40.714281Z'
Javascript Date.parse will quietly drop microseconds from the timestamp.

I use pendulum:
import pendulum
d = pendulum.now("UTC").to_iso8601_string()
print(d)
>>> 2019-10-30T00:11:21.818265Z

There are a lot of good answers on the post, but I wanted the format to come out exactly as it does with JavaScript. This is what I'm using and it works well.
In [1]: import datetime
In [1]: now = datetime.datetime.utcnow()
In [1]: now.strftime('%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%S') + now.strftime('.%f')[:4] + 'Z'
Out[3]: '2018-10-16T13:18:34.856Z'

Using only standard libraries, making no assumption that the timezone is already UTC, and returning the exact format requested in the question:
dt.astimezone(timezone.utc).replace(tzinfo=None).isoformat(timespec='milliseconds') + 'Z'
This does require Python 3.6 or later though.

>>> import arrow
>>> now = arrow.utcnow().format('YYYY-MM-DDTHH:mm:ss.SSS')
>>> now
'2018-11-28T21:34:59.235'
>>> zulu = "{}Z".format(now)
>>> zulu
'2018-11-28T21:34:59.235Z'
Or, to get it in one fell swoop:
>>> zulu = "{}Z".format(arrow.utcnow().format('YYYY-MM-DDTHH:mm:ss.SSS'))
>>> zulu
'2018-11-28T21:54:49.639Z'

By combining all answers above I came with following function :
from datetime import datetime, tzinfo, timedelta
class simple_utc(tzinfo):
def tzname(self,**kwargs):
return "UTC"
def utcoffset(self, dt):
return timedelta(0)
def getdata(yy, mm, dd, h, m, s) :
d = datetime(yy, mm, dd, h, m, s)
d = d.replace(tzinfo=simple_utc()).isoformat()
d = str(d).replace('+00:00', 'Z')
return d
print getdata(2018, 02, 03, 15, 0, 14)

pip install python-dateutil
>>> a = "2019-06-27T02:14:49.443814497Z"
>>> dateutil.parser.parse(a)
datetime.datetime(2019, 6, 27, 2, 14, 49, 443814, tzinfo=tzutc())

How to get the common name for a pytz timezone eg. EST/EDT for America/New_York

Given a pytz timezone for a particular user(calculated from his offset), i want to display the common name for that timezone. I'm assuming people are more accustomed to seeing EST or PST instead of spelled out like America/NewYork.
Does pytz give me those standard names somewhere, or will i have to manually do this via a table? This could potentially get messy, since for example places are EST in a season and shift to showing EDT during others.

Given a pytz timezone for a particular user(calculated from his offset), i want to display the common name for that timezone. I'm assuming people are more accustomed to seeing EST or PST instead of spelled out like America/NewYork.
If you need this derived from a datetime object localized with pytz...
>>> import pytz as tz
>>> from datetime import datetime as dt
>>> CT = tz.timezone('America/Chicago')
>>>
>>> summer_day = dt(2010, 7, 4, 0, 1, 1)
>>> bar = CT.localize(summer_day, is_dst=None)
>>> bar.tzname()
'CDT'
>>>
>>> christmas = dt(2010, 12, 25, 0, 1, 1)
>>> foo = CT.localize(christmas, is_dst=None)
>>> foo.tzname()
'CST'
>>>

This may not have been around when this question was originally written, but here is a snippet to get the time zone official designation:
>>> eastern = timezone('US/Eastern')
>>> eastern.zone
'US/Eastern'
Further, this can be used with a non-naive datetime object (aka a datetime where the actual timezone has been set using pytz.<timezone>.localize(<datetime_object>) or datetime_object.astimezone(pytz.<timezone>) as follows:
>>> import datetime, pytz
>>> todaynow = datetime.datetime.now(tz=pytz.timezone('US/Hawaii'))
>>> todaynow.tzinfo # turned into a string, it can be split/parsed
<DstTzInfo 'US/Hawaii' HST-1 day, 14:00:00 STD>
>>> todaynow.strftime("%Z")
'HST'
>>> todaynow.tzinfo.zone
'US/Hawaii'
This is, of course, for the edification of those search engine users who landed here. ... See more at the pytz module site.

You can use the tzname() method of tzinfo instances:
>>> tz = timezone('America/St_Johns')
>>> normal = datetime(2009, 9, 1)
>>> tz.tzname(normal, is_dst=False)
'NDT'

If you are looking for the abbreviations then there are a few ways that come to mind.
First would be:
>>> from pytz import timezone
>>> eastern = timezone('US/Eastern')
>>> eastern._tzname
'EST'
Although since that references a property with the preceding single underscore it may be considered private and might not be the best place to grab it. The other would be from a localized datetime object.
>>> from datetime import datetime
>>> loc_dt = eastern.localize(datetime.now())
>>> loc_dt.strftime('%Z')
'EST'