Examples here use the current time.

See the GNU Date and BSD Date cheatsheets for more info on formats.

Default format

Get a standardized ISO date by default.

$ date

Mon 22 Feb 2021 17:58:01 SAST

Store it.

$ CURRENT_TIME=$(date)
$ echo $CURRENT_TIME

Mon 22 Feb 2021 17:58:01 SAST

Custom format

  • Full date. 
      $ date '+%Y/%m/%d'
  2021/02/22
  • Year only. 
      $ date '+%Y'
  2021
  • Time only. 
      $ date '+%H:%M:%S'
  18:34:49
  • Date and time. 
      $ date '+%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ'

And to store it:

$ DATE=$(date '+%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ')