Correctly determine if date string is a valid date in that format

Question

You can use DateTime::createFromFormat() for this purpose:

function validateDate($date, $format = 'Y-m-d')
{
    $d = DateTime::createFromFormat($format, $date);
    // The Y ( 4 digits year ) returns TRUE for any integer with any number of digits so changing the comparison from == to === fixes the issue.
    return $d && $d->format($format) === $date;
}

^{[Function taken from this answer. Also on php.net. Originally written by Glavić.]}

---

Test cases:

var_dump(validateDate('2013-13-01'));  // false
var_dump(validateDate('20132-13-01')); // false
var_dump(validateDate('2013-11-32'));  // false
var_dump(validateDate('2012-2-25'));   // false
var_dump(validateDate('2013-12-01'));  // true
var_dump(validateDate('1970-12-01'));  // true
var_dump(validateDate('2012-02-29'));  // true
var_dump(validateDate('2012', 'Y'));   // true
var_dump(validateDate('12012', 'Y'));  // false

Demo!

Determine if any string is a date

function checkIsAValidDate($myDateString){
    return (bool)strtotime($myDateString);
}

Use in simple way with php prebuilt function:

function checkmydate($date) {
  $tempDate = explode('-', $date);
  // checkdate(month, day, year)
  return checkdate($tempDate[1], $tempDate[2], $tempDate[0]);
}

Test

   checkmydate('2015-12-01'); //true
   checkmydate('2015-14-04'); //false

Determine if string is a date, even if string is a non-standard format

(strtotime doesn't accept any custom format)

<?php
function validateDateTime($dateStr, $format)
{
    date_default_timezone_set('UTC');
    $date = DateTime::createFromFormat($format, $dateStr);
    return $date && ($date->format($format) === $dateStr);
}

// These return true
validateDateTime('2001-03-10 17:16:18', 'Y-m-d H:i:s');
validateDateTime('2001-03-10', 'Y-m-d');
validateDateTime('2001', 'Y');
validateDateTime('Mon', 'D');
validateDateTime('March 10, 2001, 5:16 pm', 'F j, Y, g:i a');
validateDateTime('March 10, 2001, 5:16 pm', 'F j, Y, g:i a');
validateDateTime('03.10.01', 'm.d.y');
validateDateTime('10, 3, 2001', 'j, n, Y');
validateDateTime('20010310', 'Ymd');
validateDateTime('05-16-18, 10-03-01', 'h-i-s, j-m-y');
validateDateTime('Monday 8th of August 2005 03:12:46 PM', 'l jS \of F Y h:i:s A');
validateDateTime('Wed, 25 Sep 2013 15:28:57', 'D, d M Y H:i:s');
validateDateTime('17:03:18 is the time', 'H:m:s \i\s \t\h\e \t\i\m\e');
validateDateTime('17:16:18', 'H:i:s');

// These return false
validateDateTime('2001-03-10 17:16:18', 'Y-m-D H:i:s');
validateDateTime('2001', 'm');
validateDateTime('Mon', 'D-m-y');
validateDateTime('Mon', 'D-m-y');
validateDateTime('2001-13-04', 'Y-m-d');

This option is not only simple but also accepts almost any format, although with non-standard formats it can be buggy.

$timestamp = strtotime($date);
return $timestamp ? $date : null;

You can also Parse the date for month date and year and then you can use the PHP function checkdate() which you can read about here: http://php.net/manual/en/function.checkdate.php

You can also try this one:

$date="2013-13-01";

if (preg_match("/^[0-9]{4}-(0[1-9]|1[0-2])-(0[1-9]|[1-2][0-9]|3[0-1])$/",$date))
    {
        echo 'Date is valid';
    }else{
        echo 'Date is invalid';
    }