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c#datetime
Ayyappan Anbalagan
Ayyappan Anbalagan

Reputation: 11312

How do I get the time difference between two DateTime objects using C#?

How do I get the time difference between two DateTime objects using C#?

Upvotes: 197

Views: 399228

Answers (9)

ChrisF
ChrisF

Reputation: 137188

You want the TimeSpan struct:

TimeSpan diff = dateTime1 - dateTime2;

A TimeSpan object represents a time interval (duration of time or elapsed time) that is measured as a positive or negative number of days, hours, minutes, seconds, and fractions of a second. The TimeSpan structure can also be used to represent the time of day, but only if the time is unrelated to a particular date.

There are various methods for getting the days, hours, minutes, seconds and milliseconds back from this structure.

If you are just interested in the difference then:

TimeSpan diff = (dateTime1 - dateTime2).Duration();

will give you the positive difference between the times regardless of the order.

If you have just got the time component but the times could be split by midnight then you need to add 24 hours to the span to get the actual difference:

TimeSpan diff = dateTime1 - dateTime2;
if (diff < 0)
{
    diff = diff + TimeSpan.FromDays(1);
}

Upvotes: 84

Mukund
Mukund

Reputation: 1689

 var startDate = new DateTime(2007, 3, 24);

 var endDate = new DateTime(2009, 6, 26);

 var dateDiff = endDate.Subtract(startDate);

 var date = string.Format("{0} years {1} months {2} days", (int)dateDiff.TotalDays / 365, 
 (int)(dateDiff.TotalDays % 365) / 30, (int)(dateDiff.TotalDays % 365) / 30);

 Console.WriteLine(date);

Upvotes: 4

Sunny Sandeep
Sunny Sandeep

Reputation: 1011

You can use in following manner to achieve difference between two Datetime Object. Suppose there are DateTime objects dt1 and dt2 then the code.

TimeSpan diff = dt2.Subtract(dt1);

Upvotes: 3

Daniel Renshaw
Daniel Renshaw

Reputation: 34187

The following example demonstrates how to do this:

DateTime a = new DateTime(2010, 05, 12, 13, 15, 00);
DateTime b = new DateTime(2010, 05, 12, 13, 45, 00);
Console.WriteLine(b.Subtract(a).TotalMinutes);

When executed this prints "30" since there is a 30 minute difference between the date/times.

The result of DateTime.Subtract(DateTime x) is a TimeSpan Object which gives other useful properties.

Upvotes: 278

Darik
Darik

Reputation: 141

The way I usually do it is subtracting the two DateTime and this gets me a TimeSpan that will tell me the diff.

Here's an example:

DateTime start = DateTime.Now;
// Do some work
TimeSpan timeDiff = DateTime.Now - start;
timeDiff.TotalMilliseconds;

Upvotes: 14

Wong Lok Pan
Wong Lok Pan

Reputation: 31

private void button1_Click(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    TimeSpan timespan;
    timespan = dateTimePicker2.Value - dateTimePicker1.Value;
    int timeDifference = timespan.Days;
    MessageBox.Show(timeDifference.ToString());
}

Upvotes: 3

Ian Mercer
Ian Mercer

Reputation: 39297

IF they are both UTC date-time values you can do TimeSpan diff = dateTime1 - dateTime2;

Otherwise your chance of getting the correct answer in every single possible case is zero.

Upvotes: 5

Jason Webb
Jason Webb

Reputation: 8020

You need to use a TimeSpan. Here is some sample code:

TimeSpan sincelast = TimeSpan.FromTicks(DateTime.Now.Ticks - LastUpdate.Ticks);

Upvotes: 3

Nate
Nate

Reputation: 30656

What you need is to use the DateTime classs Subtract method, which returns a TimeSpan.

var dateOne = DateTime.Now;
var dateTwo = DateTime.Now.AddMinutes(-5);
var diff = dateTwo.Subtract(dateOne);
var res = String.Format("{0}:{1}:{2}", diff.Hours,diff.Minutes,diff.Seconds));

Upvotes: 35

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