HTML datetime Attribute

Last Updated : 31 Jul, 2026

The HTML datetime attribute specifies the date and time associated with the content, facilitating machine-readable information. It's commonly used with elements like <time> to provide structured time-related data.

Syntax

<element datetime="YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ssTZD">

Attribute Values

This attribute contains a single value YYYY-MM-DDThh:mm:ssTZD which is used to specify the date and time when the text was deleted.

The explanation of datetime components is listed below:

  • YYYY: It sets the year of datetime object (e.g. 2009).
  • MM: It sets the month of datetime object (e.g. 05 for March).
  • DD: It sets the day of the month of datetime object (e.g. 04).
  • T: It is a required separator.
  • hh: It sets the hour of datetime object (e.g. 18 for 06.00pm).
  • mm: It sets the minutes of datetime object (e.g. 34).
  • ss: It sets the seconds of date time object (e.g. 40).
  • ZD: Time Zone Designator (Z denotes Zulu, also known as Greenwich Mean Time)

Applicable

datetime attribute is applicable for:

<del>Represents deleted or removed text within a document.
<ins>Represents inserted or added text within a document.
<time>Represents a specific period of time or a datetime stamp.

HTML datetime Attribute Example

Example : In this example we demonstrates the <ins> tag to represent inserted or added text, marking the change from "mathematical" to "computer" in the content.

html 
<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

<head>
    <title>HTML datetime Attribute</title>
</head>

<body>
    <h2>HTML datetime Attribute</h2>
    <p>
        GeeksforGeeks is a
        <del datetime="2026-07-27T10:00:00Z">mathematical</del>
        <ins datetime="2026-07-27T10:05:00Z">computer</ins>
        science portal.
    </p>
</body>

</html>
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