Python date object Convert to UTC timestamp at midnight

Question

I have python date object like

datetime.date(2020, 3, 29) # d1, django DateField in database

Now i want to get UTC timestamp of that date object d1 at midnight

I searched a lot but nothing works.

I tried

d2 = datetime.combine(d1, datetime.min.time())
d2.timestamp() // This is localtimezone i want in UTC

Not sure why i need to add time

@Mohsen that will only give me today , what if its some other date? can i do d1.utcnow() — Gonda, Apr 20 '20 at 06:43
Does this answer your question? [How to convert local time string to UTC?](https://stackoverflow.com/questions/79797/how-to-convert-local-time-string-to-utc) — Prudhvi, Apr 20 '20 at 06:47
@Prudhvi i tried all those , too complex to understand whats going on there — Gonda, Apr 20 '20 at 06:54
the datetime objects in your database, in what timezone are they in? UTC? — FObersteiner, Apr 20 '20 at 06:59
alright, I tried to provide a not too complicated answer below. working with date and time can be confusing, but stay on it. I think [this answer](https://stackoverflow.com/a/8778548/10197418) is worth having a look at. — FObersteiner, Apr 20 '20 at 07:33

FObersteiner · Accepted Answer · 2020-04-20T07:34:42.010

assuming your date object d is in UTC, you could simply add midnight time (00:00:00) and timezone info UTC and then apply timestamp() method to get the desired timestamp. Example:

import datetime as dt

d = dt.date(2020, 3, 29)
ts_utc = dt.datetime.combine(d, dt.time(0,0,0), tzinfo=dt.timezone.utc).timestamp()
print(ts_utc)
# 1585440000.0

check = dt.datetime.utcfromtimestamp(ts_utc)
print(check)
# 2020-03-29 00:00:00

Note: it is important to set the timezone, otherwise, the timestamp() method assumes that the input is in the timezone that the machine you run this code on is set to!

Python date object Convert to UTC timestamp at midnight

1 Answers1