How to compare two string dates in Java?

Question

I have two dates in String format like below -

String startDate = "2014/09/12 00:00";  String endDate = "2014/09/13 00:00"; 

I want to make sure startDate should be less than endDate. startDate should not be greater than endDate.

How can I compare these two dates and return boolean accordingly?

Answer 1

Convert them to an actual Date object, then call before.

SimpleDateFormat sdf = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy/MM/dd h:m"); System.out.println(sdf.parse(startDate).before(sdf.parse(endDate))); 

Recall that parse will throw a ParseException, so you should either catch it in this code block, or declare it to be thrown as part of your method signature.

Answer 2

Here is a fully working demo. For date formatting, refer - http://docs.oracle.com/javase/6/docs/api/java/text/SimpleDateFormat.html

import java.text.ParseException; import java.text.SimpleDateFormat; import java.util.Date; import java.util.Locale;  public class Dating {      public static void main(String[] args) {          String startDate = "2014/09/12 00:00";         String endDate = "2014/09/13 00:00";          try {             Date start = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy/MM/dd HH:mm", Locale.ENGLISH)                     .parse(startDate);             Date end = new SimpleDateFormat("yyyy/MM/dd HH:mm", Locale.ENGLISH)                     .parse(endDate);              System.out.println(start);             System.out.println(end);              if (start.compareTo(end) > 0) {                 System.out.println("start is after end");             } else if (start.compareTo(end) < 0) {                 System.out.println("start is before end");             } else if (start.compareTo(end) == 0) {                 System.out.println("start is equal to end");             } else {                 System.out.println("Something weird happened...");             }          } catch (ParseException e) {             e.printStackTrace();         }      }  }