HTML <time> Tag

The <time> tag is one of the HTML5 elements. It is used to define one of the following:

a human-readable time on a 24-hour clock,
a precise date in the Gregorian calendar (giving optional timezone and time information),
a valid time duration.

The <time> tag should not be used for dates that are prior to the introduction of the Gregorian calendar.

The datetime attribute is used to define machine-readable format, which allows search engines to produce smarter results and user agents to add reminders to the user’s calendar. When the datetime attribute is missing, the <time> element should not have any element descendants. In this case, the datetime value will be the child text content of the element.

Syntax

The <time> tag comes in pairs. The content is written between the opening (<time>) and closing (</time>) tags.

Example of the HTML <time> tag:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
  <head>
    <title>Title of the document.</title>
  </head>
  <body>
    <p>The game will be held on <time datetime="2018-09-28 19:00">September 28</time>.</p>
    <p>It will start at <time>19:00</time></p>
  </body>
</html>

Try it Yourself »

Result

Attributes

Attribute	Value	Description
datetime		Indicates the time/date of the element in the following formats:
	YYYY	- a four-digit year
	MM	- a two-digit month, 01 - 12
	DD	- a two-digit day, 01 - 31
	T	-specifies that a time value follows
	hh	-a two-digit hour, 00 - 24
	mm	- a two-digit minute, 00 - 59
	ss	-a two-digit second, 00 - 59
	TZD	- (Time Zone Designator) time zone

The <time> tag also supports the Global Attributes.

How to style <time> tag?

Common properties to alter the visual weight/emphasis/size of text in <time> tag:

CSS font-style property sets the style of the font. normal | italic | oblique | initial | inherit.
CSS font-family property specifies a prioritized list of one or more font family names and/or generic family names for the selected element.
CSS font-size property sets the size of the font.
CSS font-weight property defines whether the font should be bold or thick.
CSS text-transform property controls text case and capitalization.
CSS text-decoration property specifies the decoration added to text, and is a shorthand property for text-decoration-line, text-decoration-color, text-decoration-style.

Coloring text in <time> tag:

CSS color property describes the color of the text content and text decorations.
CSS background-color property sets the background color of an element.

Text layout styles for <time> tag:

CSS text-indent property specifies the indentation of the first line in a text block.
CSS text-overflow property specifies how overflowed content that is not displayed should be signalled to the user.
CSS white-space property specifies how white-space inside an element is handled.
CSS word-break property specifies where the lines should be broken.

Other properties worth looking at for <time> tag:

CSS text-shadow property adds shadow to text.
CSS text-align-last property sets the alignment of the last line of the text.
CSS line-height property specifies the height of a line.
CSS letter-spacing property defines the spaces between letters/characters in a text.
CSS word-spacing property sets the spacing between words.