How to display time in 12 hour format in Objective-C?

Question

I was working on an iPhone application, and I need to display the time in a label. So I wrote the follow:

NSDate *date = [NSDate date];
NSDateFormatter *dateFormatter = [[NSDateFormatter alloc] init];
[dateFormatter setDateFormat:@"HH:mm a"];
NSString *formattedDateString = [dateFormatter stringFromDate:date];
timeLabel.text = formattedDateString;**

It displays time in label but in 24H format.

• Example: 15.00 PM instead of 3.00 PM

I want to display time in 12h format, i.e. 3.00 PM

What should I do?

Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

[dateFormatter setDateFormat:@"hh:mm a"];

Note the lower case h's.

Answer 2

    Date Formats a: AM/PM
    A: 0~86399999 (Millisecond of Day)

    c/cc: 1~7 (Day of Week)
    ccc: Sun/Mon/Tue/Wed/Thu/Fri/Sat
    cccc: Sunday/Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday/Friday/Saturday

    d: 1~31 (0 padded Day of Month)
    D: 1~366 (0 padded Day of Year)

    e: 1~7 (0 padded Day of Week)
    E~EEE: Sun/Mon/Tue/Wed/Thu/Fri/Sat
    EEEE: Sunday/Monday/Tuesday/Wednesday/Thursday/Friday/Saturday

    F: 1~5 (0 padded Week of Month, first day of week = Monday)

    g: Julian Day Number (number of days since 4713 BC January 1)
    G~GGG: BC/AD (Era Designator Abbreviated)
    GGGG: Before Christ/Anno Domini

    h: 1~12 (0 padded Hour (12hr))
    H: 0~23 (0 padded Hour (24hr))

    k: 1~24 (0 padded Hour (24hr)
    K: 0~11 (0 padded Hour (12hr))

    L/LL: 1~12 (0 padded Month)
    LLL: Jan/Feb/Mar/Apr/May/Jun/Jul/Aug/Sep/Oct/Nov/Dec
    LLLL: January/February/March/April/May/June/July/August/September/October/November/December

    m: 0~59 (0 padded Minute)
    M/MM: 1~12 (0 padded Month)
    MMM: Jan/Feb/Mar/Apr/May/Jun/Jul/Aug/Sep/Oct/Nov/Dec
    MMMM: January/February/March/April/May/June/July/August/September/October/November/December

    q/qq: 1~4 (0 padded Quarter)
    qqq: Q1/Q2/Q3/Q4
    qqqq: 1st quarter/2nd quarter/3rd quarter/4th quarter
    Q/QQ: 1~4 (0 padded Quarter)
    QQQ: Q1/Q2/Q3/Q4
    QQQQ: 1st quarter/2nd quarter/3rd quarter/4th quarter

    s: 0~59 (0 padded Second)
    S: (rounded Sub-Second)

    u: (0 padded Year)

    v~vvv: (General GMT Timezone Abbreviation)
    vvvv: (General GMT Timezone Name)

    w: 1~53 (0 padded Week of Year, 1st day of week = Sunday, NB: 1st week of year starts from the last Sunday of last year)
    W: 1~5 (0 padded Week of Month, 1st day of week = Sunday)

    y/yyyy: (Full Year)
    yy/yyy: (2 Digits Year)
    Y/YYYY: (Full Year, starting from the Sunday of the 1st week of year)
    YY/YYY: (2 Digits Year, starting from the Sunday of the 1st week of year)

    z~zzz: (Specific GMT Timezone Abbreviation)
    zzzz: (Specific GMT Timezone Name)
    Z: +0000 (RFC 822 Timezone)

How to Use:

NSDateFormatter *dateFormatter = [[NSDateFormatter alloc] init];
[dateFormatter setDateFormat:@"dd/MM/yyyy hh:mm:ss a"];
NSLog(@"%@", [dateFormatter dateFromString:@"12/12/2012 12:12:12 AM"]);

Answer 3

Just take a look UNICODE LOCALE DATA MARKUP LANGUAGE

Guess you have to use KK instead of HH ...

Answer 4

Reading the documentation is a good practice.

HH- is just showing the 0 when its 2,3,4 oclock. It's NOT 0-12 AM/PM format.

See “Date Formatters” there for more details.

in your case:

Appendix F: Date Format Patterns

h:mm a -> 3:00 PM