Incrementing a java.util.Date by one day

Question

What is the correct way to increment a java.util.Date by one day.

I'm thinking something like

        Calendar cal = Calendar.getInstance();         cal.setTime(toDate);         cal.add(Calendar.DATE, 1);         toDate = cal.getTime(); 

It doesn't 'feel' right.

Answer 1

That would work.

It doesn't 'feel' right.

If it is the verbosity that bothers you, welcome to the Java date-time API :-)

Answer 2

If you do not like the math in the solution from Tony Ennis

Date someDate = new Date(); // Or whatever Date dayAfter = new Date(someDate.getTime() + TimeUnit.DAYS.toMillis( 1 )); 

But more or less since finding this Q/A, I have been using JodaTime, instead, and have recently switched to the new DateTime in Java 8 (which inspired by but not copied from Joda - thanks @BasilBourqueless for pointing this out).

Java 8

In Java 8, almost all time-based classes have a .plusDays() method making this task trivial:

LocalDateTime.now()  .plusDays(1); LocalDate.now()      .plusDays(1); ZonedDateTime.now()  .plusDays(1); Duration.ofDays(1)   .plusDays(1); Period.ofYears(1)    .plusDays(1); OffsetTime.now()     .plus(1, ChronoUnit.DAYS); OffsetDateTime.now() .plus(1, ChronoUnit.DAYS); Instant.now()        .plus(1, ChronoUnit.DAYS); 

Java 8 also added classes and methods to interoperate between the (now) legacy Date and Calendar etc. and the new DateTime classes, which are most certainly the better choice for all new development.