Converting timestamp to time ago in PHP e.g 1 day ago, 2 days ago...

Question

I am trying to convert a timestamp of the format 2009-09-12 20:57:19 and turn it into something like 3 minutes ago with PHP.

I found a useful script to do this, but I think it's looking for a different format to be used as the time variable. The script I'm wanting to modify to work with this format is:

function _ago($tm,$rcs = 0) {
    $cur_tm = time(); 
    $dif = $cur_tm-$tm;
    $pds = array('second','minute','hour','day','week','month','year','decade');
    $lngh = array(1,60,3600,86400,604800,2630880,31570560,315705600);

    for($v = sizeof($lngh)-1; ($v >= 0)&&(($no = $dif/$lngh[$v])<=1); $v--); if($v < 0) $v = 0; $_tm = $cur_tm-($dif%$lngh[$v]);
        $no = floor($no);
        if($no <> 1)
            $pds[$v] .='s';
        $x = sprintf("%d %s ",$no,$pds[$v]);
        if(($rcs == 1)&&($v >= 1)&&(($cur_tm-$_tm) > 0))
            $x .= time_ago($_tm);
        return $x;
    }

I think on those first few lines the script is trying to do something that looks like this (different date format math):

$dif = 1252809479 - 2009-09-12 20:57:19;

How would I go about converting my timestamp into that (unix?) format?

Prior

possible duplicate of How to calculate the difference between two dates using PHP? – Mahau

PHP & jQuery example here freakyjolly.com/convert-date-time-to-facebook-style – Mccartan

Answer 1

Use example :

echo time_elapsed_string('2013-05-01 00:22:35');
echo time_elapsed_string('@1367367755'); # timestamp input
echo time_elapsed_string('2013-05-01 00:22:35', true);

Input can be any supported date and time format.

Output :

4 months ago
4 months ago
4 months, 2 weeks, 3 days, 1 hour, 49 minutes, 15 seconds ago

Function :

function time_elapsed_string($datetime, $full = false) {
    $now = new DateTime;
    $ago = new DateTime($datetime);
    $diff = $now->diff($ago);

    $diff->w = floor($diff->d / 7);
    $diff->d -= $diff->w * 7;

    $string = array(
        'y' => 'year',
        'm' => 'month',
        'w' => 'week',
        'd' => 'day',
        'h' => 'hour',
        'i' => 'minute',
        's' => 'second',
    );
    foreach ($string as $k => &$v) {
        if ($diff->$k) {
            $v = $diff->$k . ' ' . $v . ($diff->$k > 1 ? 's' : '');
        } else {
            unset($string[$k]);
        }
    }

    if (!$full) $string = array_slice($string, 0, 1);
    return $string ? implode(', ', $string) . ' ago' : 'just now';
}

Baumgardner

The week part is nice but overall the function should be more flexible ($full should be a string input to filter the output as needed). e.g. time_elapsed_string($datetime, $format = "ymw"). P.S. Flat version: https://mcmap.net/q/89085/-php-time-since-function-duplicate – Cyr

Regarding my last comment: Change $full = false to $level = 7 and if (!$full) $string = array_slice($string, 0, 1); to $string = array_slice($string, 0, $level); and call time_elapsed_string($datetime, 2) to obtain only the two highest date strings. I think this shoud fit all needs. – Cyr

@mgutt: ofc this function will not work for any-case-user-wants-scenario; but it is a nice starting point, where you can, with minimal fix, get what you need, like you already demonstrated... – Mahau

I'm getting Unknown property (w) at this line $diff->w = floor($diff->d / 7); – Braswell

@vonUbisch: are you using PHP version 5.3.0 - 5.3.5? If you do, upgrade it :D or slightly modify the function. – Mahau

True, 5.3.1 to be exact, thanks for the explanation. – Braswell

@Glavić: good work. better show timago for 3 days after 3 days date show in normal like: 01/01/2015. ie: stackoverflow work with this method and after X days show full date. can u edit u answer?! – Noleta

@Perspolis: why would I modify this function? Don't even call this function if date is older that 3 days. – Mahau

To fix this issue Unknown property (w) issue in PHP5.3 and below, convert $diff from an object into an array and adjust the rest of the code accordingly. I have the fix posted here: https://mcmap.net/q/89086/-unknown-property-w – Applicatory

you might wanna add a if(!$datetime) { return 'never'; } if you use it to display login times – Prayer

@JörnBerkefeld: for you maybe this works, for others not. Everyone has a possibility to modify the function in there project. Here is best to keep function as clean as possible. – Mahau

I totally agree! hence the comment with an "if" and not an edit of your answer which I originally started ;-) – Prayer

I test this.Best solution.Thank you dear... . Your foreach loop will run only 7 times and not heavy process. It's good. – Uball

$string ? implode(', ', $string) . ($diff->invert ? ' ago' : '') : 'just now'; if use feature time the use $diff->invert – Piselli

@AbhijitKumbhar: 2nd parameter of DateTime is timezone. example – Mahau

Whenever you use a parameter by reference in a for loop, &$v, you should unset it when you are done to prevent unexpected behavior. After your for loop, unset( $v ); – Hamo

@Saeven: there is no unexpected behavior when you know what you are doing. Since variable $v is not used anywhere else in the function, you do not need to unset it... – Mahau

@Baumgardner it was a general comment for anyone who runs across this. Internally, I never merge PRs that contain references in for loops. There's always a way to do without it. Good post here: schlueters.de/blog/archives/141-References-and-foreach.html – Hamo

It doesn't work for me. I use a NOW() date and it shows me 2 hours ago – Repose

@paulalexandru: like you figure out, you had timezone issues. This function could be modified so DateTime accepts 2nd parameter, which is timezone. – Mahau

Well you better customize the function or leave the note I added otherwise if somebody will have this issue, he might get stuck. Thanks – Repose

@paulalexandru: there are thousand issues with timezones on SO. If I would add every request to this function, it would be 500 lines long. Let's make function simple, and every1 can modify it to suit there needs. On other hand; I would not use global setting to set timezone, like you proposed. I would rather do in like this: eval.in/796995 – Mahau

nice , thanks for this code.but i am getting few differences in time with my database datetime value.can you help me out? – Flung

@rahulsingh: you probably have timezone issues. What is your default timezone? And in what format is your datetime input? – Mahau

@xamDev: your problem has nothing to do with this function; you are mixing AM and PM, or you don't understand date format. Check how compound formats are parsed: php.net/manual/en/datetime.formats.php – Mahau

what if i want the reverse! i mean i give 5 years, 9 months, 1 week, 5 days, 22 hours ago and i want to get 2013-05-01 00:22:01 .. is it possible! – Urine

@Glavić: in the current solution the plurality is defined as + 's' (which is fine in English)... but what to do if you want to change this logic manually for each time unit? So for example in Dutch year = jaar and years = jaren, month = maand and months = maanden, week = week and weeks = weken. – Kan

try this and with yours https://mcmap.net/q/88638/-converting-timestamp-to-time-ago-in-php-e-g-1-day-ago-2-days-ago – Triceps

@Monzur: Sorry, this is the wrong approach. You are saying that code shows wrong, and you are not willing to back up that up with nothing, not even with description of what is showing wrong. Please show me an example of my code not working, and I will tell you what is that. – Mahau

Thanks for the code example but I need only seconds, minutes, hours and days, nothing more. Can you help me please? – Flatling

if you need to round up: $diff = $now->diff($ago); if(!$full){ if($diff->s > 30) $diff->i++; if($diff->i > 30) $diff->h++; if($diff->h > 12) $diff->d++; if($diff->d > 15) $diff->m++; if($diff->m > 6) $diff->y++; if($diff->i === 60) $diff->i = 0; if($diff->h === 24) $diff->h = 0; } $diff->w = floor($diff->d / 7); – Vivle

Thanks, it will also convert MySQL DATETIME to time ago functionality – Effort

Is this recommended to use in 2021? I still upvote this question – Mccants

@ŕ̷͉ge̸ḓ̶̅i̷t still :D – Mahau

Deprecated: Creation of dynamic property DateInterval::$w is deprecated I dont know how to fix #74589089 – Palpebrate

Answer 2

function time_elapsed_string($ptime)
{
    $etime = time() - $ptime;

    if ($etime < 1)
    {
        return '0 seconds';
    }

    $a = array( 365 * 24 * 60 * 60  =>  'year',
                 30 * 24 * 60 * 60  =>  'month',
                      24 * 60 * 60  =>  'day',
                           60 * 60  =>  'hour',
                                60  =>  'minute',
                                 1  =>  'second'
                );
    $a_plural = array( 'year'   => 'years',
                       'month'  => 'months',
                       'day'    => 'days',
                       'hour'   => 'hours',
                       'minute' => 'minutes',
                       'second' => 'seconds'
                );

    foreach ($a as $secs => $str)
    {
        $d = $etime / $secs;
        if ($d >= 1)
        {
            $r = round($d);
            return $r . ' ' . ($r > 1 ? $a_plural[$str] : $str) . ' ago';
        }
    }
}

Salmanazar

This is not good solution, since it is using 30days for month, and 12x30days for year, and because of that it will return invalid number of years bellow year <= 1978. Example where it returns 39 years, but it should 38. And it also doesn't work for years bellow 1970. – Mahau

Terrible solution. Why does this have 42 upvotes and selected answer? Since when does every month have 30 days? – Influent

@Ayman Hussein, it gives me this error: Fatal error: time_elapsed_string(): Unknown property (w) in – Maltzman

@wassimboy, could you please tell me why you want to down vote my answer. if my answer is not good enough you can write a comment to correct it without down vote. – Salmanazar

Your answer is not good because it counts 30 days per month and not all months have 30 days. Read the other comments above. – Referential

@Baumgardner what is your opinion about this ? – Tillotson

This is a function to return a general phrase, like "roughly how long ago was this comment made"? It is not precise and has some downfalls, as mentioned above, but for dates in the near past (say 30 years near past and less) it give us non-precise humans an idea how long ago an event occurred. Worked well for my application. – Seavir

What should be the proper format for ptime ? second ? big int ? mySQL timestamp ? Can some one please clarify that ? Thanks. – Woodcut

Chill out. World will be doomed when it'll show inccorrect number of years of today's dates ;) – Titanite

This is a great solution, and an elegant solution. This type of script is usually used to show how much time has past (in general terms) since something happened. It doesn't need to be precise. One year is now calculated as "365 * 24 * 60 * 60" which works well. +1 Vote – Chook

Answer 3

I don't know why nobody mention Carbon yet.

https://github.com/briannesbitt/Carbon

This is actually an extension to php dateTime (which was already used here) and it has: diffForHumans method. So all you need to do is:

$dt = Carbon::parse('2012-9-5 23:26:11.123789');
echo $dt->diffForHumans();

more examples: http://carbon.nesbot.com/docs/#api-humandiff

Pros of this solution:

• it works for future dates and will return something like in 2 months etc.
• you can use localization to get other languages and the pluralization works fine
• if you will start using Carbon for other things working with dates will be as easy as never.

Pasturage

Answer 4

$time_elapsed = timeAgo($time_ago); //The argument $time_ago is in timestamp (Y-m-d H:i:s)format.

//Function definition

function timeAgo($time_ago)
{
    $time_ago = strtotime($time_ago);
    $cur_time   = time();
    $time_elapsed   = $cur_time - $time_ago;
    $seconds    = $time_elapsed ;
    $minutes    = round($time_elapsed / 60 );
    $hours      = round($time_elapsed / 3600);
    $days       = round($time_elapsed / 86400 );
    $weeks      = round($time_elapsed / 604800);
    $months     = round($time_elapsed / 2600640 );
    $years      = round($time_elapsed / 31207680 );
    // Seconds
    if($seconds <= 60){
        return "just now";
    }
    //Minutes
    else if($minutes <=60){
        if($minutes==1){
            return "one minute ago";
        }
        else{
            return "$minutes minutes ago";
        }
    }
    //Hours
    else if($hours <=24){
        if($hours==1){
            return "an hour ago";
        }else{
            return "$hours hrs ago";
        }
    }
    //Days
    else if($days <= 7){
        if($days==1){
            return "yesterday";
        }else{
            return "$days days ago";
        }
    }
    //Weeks
    else if($weeks <= 4.3){
        if($weeks==1){
            return "a week ago";
        }else{
            return "$weeks weeks ago";
        }
    }
    //Months
    else if($months <=12){
        if($months==1){
            return "a month ago";
        }else{
            return "$months months ago";
        }
    }
    //Years
    else{
        if($years==1){
            return "one year ago";
        }else{
            return "$years years ago";
        }
    }
}

Instance

Answer 5

This is actually a better solution I've found. Uses jQuery however it works perfectly. Also it refreshes automatically similar to the way SO and Facebook does so you don't have to refresh the page to see the updates.

This plugin will read your datetime attr in the <time> tag and fill it in for you.

e.g. "4 minutes ago" or "about 1 day ago

http://timeago.yarp.com/

Exult

Perfectly working and showing the desired result in IST time – Mellissamellitz

how to use php timestamp 2020-12-19 13:12:58 with this plugin – Kovacev

Answer 6

I found results like the following ugly:

1 years, 2 months, 0 days, 0 hours, 53 minutes and 1 seconds

Because of that I realized a function that respects plurals, removes empty values and optionally it is possible to shorten the output:

function since($timestamp, $level=6) {
    global $lang;
    $date = new DateTime();
    $date->setTimestamp($timestamp);
    $date = $date->diff(new DateTime());
    // build array
    $since = array_combine(array('year', 'month', 'day', 'hour', 'minute', 'second'), explode(',', $date->format('%y,%m,%d,%h,%i,%s')));
    // remove empty date values
    $since = array_filter($since);
    // output only the first x date values
    $since = array_slice($since, 0, $level);
    // build string
    $last_key = key(array_slice($since, -1, 1, true));
    $string = '';
    foreach ($since as $key => $val) {
        // separator
        if ($string) {
            $string .= $key != $last_key ? ', ' : ' ' . $lang['and'] . ' ';
        }
        // set plural
        $key .= $val > 1 ? 's' : '';
        // add date value
        $string .= $val . ' ' . $lang[ $key ];
    }
    return $string;
}

Looks much better:

1 year, 2 months, 53 minutes and 1 second

Optionally use $level = 2 to shorten it as follows:

1 year and 2 months

Remove the $lang part if you need it only in English or edit this translation to fit your needs:

$lang = array(
    'second' => 'Sekunde',
    'seconds' => 'Sekunden',
    'minute' => 'Minute',
    'minutes' => 'Minuten',
    'hour' => 'Stunde',
    'hours' => 'Stunden',
    'day' => 'Tag',
    'days' => 'Tage',
    'month' => 'Monat',
    'months' => 'Monate',
    'year' => 'Jahr',
    'years' => 'Jahre',
    'and' => 'und',
);

Cyr

Of all, this one works well for me. Although it does not show to go or ago, but works both ways. Easy fix: if ($date->invert > 0) { $ending = " to go"; } else { $ending = " ago"; } Just add $ending to the $string. – Prelusive

Use of json functions here is a big performance hit and entirely unnecessary. This is not a good solution. – Woodard

@Woodard Thank you for your feedback. I changed the line against explode and array_combine. – Cyr

Why global? Read some www.PhpTheRightWay.com please. – Aluminiferous

Answer 7

function humanTiming ($time)
        {

            $time = time() - $time; // to get the time since that moment
            $time = ($time<1)? 1 : $time;
            $tokens = array (
                31536000 => 'year',
                2592000 => 'month',
                604800 => 'week',
                86400 => 'day',
                3600 => 'hour',
                60 => 'minute',
                1 => 'second'
            );

            foreach ($tokens as $unit => $text) {
                if ($time < $unit) continue;
                $numberOfUnits = floor($time / $unit);
                return $numberOfUnits.' '.$text.(($numberOfUnits>1)?'s':'');
            }

        }

echo humanTiming( strtotime($mytimestring) );

Shashaban

This is really great. Thank you for sharing. But there are instances where the function returns $numberOfUnits empty and it just outputs "ago". Seemingly because the value is less than 1 second. In that instance if you could make it default to something like "just now" this would be perfect. – Turboprop

Answer 8

i made this and it's working just fine it's working for both unix timestamp like 1470919932 or formatted time like 16-08-11 14:53:30

function timeAgo($time_ago) {
    $time_ago =  strtotime($time_ago) ? strtotime($time_ago) : $time_ago;
    $time  = time() - $time_ago;

switch($time):
// seconds
case $time <= 60;
return 'lessthan a minute ago';
// minutes
case $time >= 60 && $time < 3600;
return (round($time/60) == 1) ? 'a minute' : round($time/60).' minutes ago';
// hours
case $time >= 3600 && $time < 86400;
return (round($time/3600) == 1) ? 'a hour ago' : round($time/3600).' hours ago';
// days
case $time >= 86400 && $time < 604800;
return (round($time/86400) == 1) ? 'a day ago' : round($time/86400).' days ago';
// weeks
case $time >= 604800 && $time < 2600640;
return (round($time/604800) == 1) ? 'a week ago' : round($time/604800).' weeks ago';
// months
case $time >= 2600640 && $time < 31207680;
return (round($time/2600640) == 1) ? 'a month ago' : round($time/2600640).' months ago';
// years
case $time >= 31207680;
return (round($time/31207680) == 1) ? 'a year ago' : round($time/31207680).' years ago' ;

endswitch;
}

?>

Machzor

Shouldn't that be switch (true) even though $time will evaluate to true? – Amphicoelous

Answer 9

I modified the original function a bit to be (in my opinion more useful, or logical).

// display "X time" ago, $rcs is precision depth
function time_ago ($tm, $rcs = 0) {
  $cur_tm = time(); 
  $dif = $cur_tm - $tm;
  $pds = array('second','minute','hour','day','week','month','year','decade');
  $lngh = array(1,60,3600,86400,604800,2630880,31570560,315705600);

  for ($v = count($lngh) - 1; ($v >= 0) && (($no = $dif / $lngh[$v]) <= 1); $v--);
    if ($v < 0)
      $v = 0;
  $_tm = $cur_tm - ($dif % $lngh[$v]);

  $no = ($rcs ? floor($no) : round($no)); // if last denomination, round

  if ($no != 1)
    $pds[$v] .= 's';
  $x = $no . ' ' . $pds[$v];

  if (($rcs > 0) && ($v >= 1))
    $x .= ' ' . $this->time_ago($_tm, $rcs - 1);

  return $x;
}

Gnomic

Any function that uses math based on a fixed calendar is fundamentally flawed. Use the Date object, don't do math with time. – Carp

@chris-baker When most people use these types of functions, precision to the second is not necessary. The function is accurate over short periods of time, and over long periods of time, being close is more than good enough. – Gnomic

Answer 10

I usually use this to find out difference between current and passed datetime stamp

OUTPUT

//If difference is greater than 7 days
7 June 2019

// if difference is greater than 24 hours and less than 7 days
1 days ago
6 days ago

1 hour ago
23 hours ago

1 minute ago
58 minutes ago

1 second ago
20 seconds ago

CODE

//return current date time
function getCurrentDateTime(){
    //date_default_timezone_set("Asia/Calcutta");
    return date("Y-m-d H:i:s");
}
function getDateString($date){
    $dateArray = date_parse_from_format('Y/m/d', $date);
    $monthName = DateTime::createFromFormat('!m', $dateArray['month'])->format('F');
    return $dateArray['day'] . " " . $monthName  . " " . $dateArray['year'];
}

function getDateTimeDifferenceString($datetime){
    $currentDateTime = new DateTime(getCurrentDateTime());
    $passedDateTime = new DateTime($datetime);
    $interval = $currentDateTime->diff($passedDateTime);
    //$elapsed = $interval->format('%y years %m months %a days %h hours %i minutes %s seconds');
    $day = $interval->format('%a');
    $hour = $interval->format('%h');
    $min = $interval->format('%i');
    $seconds = $interval->format('%s');

    if($day > 7)
        return getDateString($datetime);
    else if($day >= 1 && $day <= 7 ){
        if($day == 1) return $day . " day ago";
        return $day . " days ago";
    }else if($hour >= 1 && $hour <= 24){
        if($hour == 1) return $hour . " hour ago";
        return $hour . " hours ago";
    }else if($min >= 1 && $min <= 60){
        if($min == 1) return $min . " minute ago";
        return $min . " minutes ago";
    }else if($seconds >= 1 && $seconds <= 60){
        if($seconds == 1) return $seconds . " second ago";
        return $seconds . " seconds ago";
    }
}

Acrodrome

Thanks for this. I actually converted it to C# code. – Mahler

Undefined function getCurrentDateTime() fyi – Cathepsin

@gfivehost added the function code, you can check it now. – Acrodrome

i really like this snippet. but DateTime does not support locale settings to have translated datetime formarts like name of the days or months. eg in getDateString() format('F') is english only. A switch to IntlDateFormatter and gettext() for the custom output during the first 7 days will solve this for i18n – Operable

Answer 11

Just to throw in another option...

Whilst I prefer the DateTime method posting here, I didn't like the fact it displayed 0 years etc.

/* 
 * Returns a string stating how long ago this happened
 */

private function timeElapsedString($ptime){
    $diff = time() - $ptime;
    $calc_times = array();
    $timeleft   = array();

    // Prepare array, depending on the output we want to get.
    $calc_times[] = array('Year',   'Years',   31557600);
    $calc_times[] = array('Month',  'Months',  2592000);
    $calc_times[] = array('Day',    'Days',    86400);
    $calc_times[] = array('Hour',   'Hours',   3600);
    $calc_times[] = array('Minute', 'Minutes', 60);
    $calc_times[] = array('Second', 'Seconds', 1);

    foreach ($calc_times AS $timedata){
        list($time_sing, $time_plur, $offset) = $timedata;

        if ($diff >= $offset){
            $left = floor($diff / $offset);
            $diff -= ($left * $offset);
            $timeleft[] = "{$left} " . ($left == 1 ? $time_sing : $time_plur);
        }
    }

    return $timeleft ? (time() > $ptime ? null : '-') . implode(' ', $timeleft) : 0;
}

Currycomb

Answer 12

To directly answer the question... you can use...

strtotime()

https://www.php.net/manual/en/function.strtotime.php

$dif = time() - strtotime("2009-09-12 20:57:19");

E.G:

echo round(((( time() - strtotime("2021-08-01 21:57:50") )/60)/60)/24).' day(s) ago';

Result: 1 day(s) ago

Wappes

Answer 13

it help you check it

   function calculate_time_span($seconds)
{  
 $year = floor($seconds /31556926);
$months = floor($seconds /2629743);
$week=floor($seconds /604800);
$day = floor($seconds /86400); 
$hours = floor($seconds / 3600);
 $mins = floor(($seconds - ($hours*3600)) / 60); 
$secs = floor($seconds % 60);
 if($seconds < 60) $time = $secs." seconds ago";
 else if($seconds < 3600 ) $time =($mins==1)?$mins."now":$mins." mins ago";
 else if($seconds < 86400) $time = ($hours==1)?$hours." hour ago":$hours." hours ago";
 else if($seconds < 604800) $time = ($day==1)?$day." day ago":$day." days ago";
 else if($seconds < 2629743) $time = ($week==1)?$week." week ago":$week." weeks ago";
 else if($seconds < 31556926) $time =($months==1)? $months." month ago":$months." months ago";
 else $time = ($year==1)? $year." year ago":$year." years ago";
return $time; 
}  
  $seconds = time() - strtotime($post->post_date); 
echo calculate_time_span($seconds); 

Zadazadack

Answer 14

Try this, I found it from my old codes, which shows the correct Result

function ago($datefrom, $dateto = -1) {
    // Defaults and assume if 0 is passed in that
    // its an error rather than the epoch

    if ($datefrom == 0) {
        return "A long time ago";
    }
    if ($dateto == -1) {
        $dateto = time();
    }

    // Make the entered date into Unix timestamp from MySQL datetime field

    $datefrom = strtotime($datefrom);

    // Calculate the difference in seconds betweeen
    // the two timestamps

    $difference = $dateto - $datefrom;

    // Based on the interval, determine the
    // number of units between the two dates
    // From this point on, you would be hard
    // pushed telling the difference between
    // this function and DateDiff. If the $datediff
    // returned is 1, be sure to return the singular
    // of the unit, e.g. 'day' rather 'days'

    switch (true) {
        // If difference is less than 60 seconds,
        // seconds is a good interval of choice
        case(strtotime('-1 min', $dateto) < $datefrom):
            $datediff = $difference;
            $res = ($datediff == 1) ? $datediff . ' second' : $datediff . ' seconds';
            break;
        // If difference is between 60 seconds and
        // 60 minutes, minutes is a good interval
        case(strtotime('-1 hour', $dateto) < $datefrom):
            $datediff = floor($difference / 60);
            $res = ($datediff == 1) ? $datediff . ' minute' : $datediff . ' minutes';
            break;
        // If difference is between 1 hour and 24 hours
        // hours is a good interval
        case(strtotime('-1 day', $dateto) < $datefrom):
            $datediff = floor($difference / 60 / 60);
            $res = ($datediff == 1) ? $datediff . ' hour' : $datediff . ' hours';
            break;
        // If difference is between 1 day and 7 days
        // days is a good interval                
        case(strtotime('-1 week', $dateto) < $datefrom):
            $day_difference = 1;
            while (strtotime('-' . $day_difference . ' day', $dateto) >= $datefrom) {
                $day_difference++;
            }

            $datediff = $day_difference;
            $res = ($datediff == 1) ? 'yesterday' : $datediff . ' days';
            break;
        // If difference is between 1 week and 30 days
        // weeks is a good interval            
        case(strtotime('-1 month', $dateto) < $datefrom):
            $week_difference = 1;
            while (strtotime('-' . $week_difference . ' week', $dateto) >= $datefrom) {
                $week_difference++;
            }

            $datediff = $week_difference;
            $res = ($datediff == 1) ? 'last week' : $datediff . ' weeks';
            break;
        // If difference is between 30 days and 365 days
        // months is a good interval, again, the same thing
        // applies, if the 29th February happens to exist
        // between your 2 dates, the function will return
        // the 'incorrect' value for a day
        case(strtotime('-1 year', $dateto) < $datefrom):
            $months_difference = 1;
            while (strtotime('-' . $months_difference . ' month', $dateto) >= $datefrom) {
                $months_difference++;
            }

            $datediff = $months_difference;
            $res = ($datediff == 1) ? $datediff . ' month' : $datediff . ' months';

            break;
        // If difference is greater than or equal to 365
        // days, return year. This will be incorrect if
        // for example, you call the function on the 28th April
        // 2008 passing in 29th April 2007. It will return
        // 1 year ago when in actual fact (yawn!) not quite
        // a year has gone by
        case(strtotime('-1 year', $dateto) >= $datefrom):
            $year_difference = 1;
            while (strtotime('-' . $year_difference . ' year', $dateto) >= $datefrom) {
                $year_difference++;
            }

            $datediff = $year_difference;
            $res = ($datediff == 1) ? $datediff . ' year' : $datediff . ' years';
            break;
    }
    return $res;
}

Example: echo ago('2020-06-03 00:14:21 AM');

Output: 6 days

Triceps

Answer 15

I'm aware that there are several answers here, but this is what I came up with. This only handles MySQL DATETIME values as per the original question I was responding to. The array $a needs some work. I welcome comments on how to improve. Call as:

echo time_elapsed_string('2014-11-14 09:42:28');

function time_elapsed_string($ptime)
{
    // Past time as MySQL DATETIME value
    $ptime = strtotime($ptime);

    // Current time as MySQL DATETIME value
    $csqltime = date('Y-m-d H:i:s');

    // Current time as Unix timestamp
    $ctime = strtotime($csqltime); 

    // Elapsed time
    $etime = $ctime - $ptime;

    // If no elapsed time, return 0
    if ($etime < 1){
        return '0 seconds';
    }

    $a = array( 365 * 24 * 60 * 60  =>  'year',
                 30 * 24 * 60 * 60  =>  'month',
                      24 * 60 * 60  =>  'day',
                           60 * 60  =>  'hour',
                                60  =>  'minute',
                                 1  =>  'second'
    );

    $a_plural = array( 'year'   => 'years',
                       'month'  => 'months',
                       'day'    => 'days',
                       'hour'   => 'hours',
                       'minute' => 'minutes',
                       'second' => 'seconds'
    );

    foreach ($a as $secs => $str){
        // Divide elapsed time by seconds
        $d = $etime / $secs;
        if ($d >= 1){
            // Round to the next lowest integer 
            $r = floor($d);
            // Calculate time to remove from elapsed time
            $rtime = $r * $secs;
            // Recalculate and store elapsed time for next loop
            if(($etime - $rtime)  < 0){
                $etime -= ($r - 1) * $secs;
            }
            else{
                $etime -= $rtime;
            }
            // Create string to return
            $estring = $estring . $r . ' ' . ($r > 1 ? $a_plural[$str] : $str) . ' ';
        }
    }
    return $estring . ' ago';
}

Phyfe

Answer 16

I tried this and works fine for me

$datetime1 = new DateTime('2009-10-11');
$datetime2 = new DateTime('2009-10-10');
$difference = $datetime1->diff($datetime2);
echo formatOutput($difference);

function formatOutput($diff){
    /* function to return the highrst defference fount */
    if(!is_object($diff)){
        return;
    }

    if($diff->y > 0){
        return $diff->y .(" year".($diff->y > 1?"s":"")." ago");
    }

    if($diff->m > 0){
        return $diff->m .(" month".($diff->m > 1?"s":"")." ago");
    }

    if($diff->d > 0){
        return $diff->d .(" day".($diff->d > 1?"s":"")." ago");
    }

    if($diff->h > 0){
        return $diff->h .(" hour".($diff->h > 1?"s":"")." ago");
    }

    if($diff->i > 0){
        return $diff->i .(" minute".($diff->i > 1?"s":"")." ago");
    }

    if($diff->s > 0){
        return $diff->s .(" second".($diff->s > 1?"s":"")." ago");
    }
}

Check this link for reference here

Thanks! and have fun.

Bromism

Answer 17

This is what I went with. Its a modified version of Abbbas khan's post:

<?php

  function calculate_time_span($post_time)
  {  
  $seconds = time() - strtotime($post);
  $year = floor($seconds /31556926);
  $months = floor($seconds /2629743);
  $week=floor($seconds /604800);
  $day = floor($seconds /86400); 
  $hours = floor($seconds / 3600);
  $mins = floor(($seconds - ($hours*3600)) / 60); 
  $secs = floor($seconds % 60);
  if($seconds < 60) $time = $secs." seconds ago";
  else if($seconds < 3600 ) $time =($mins==1)?$mins."now":$mins." mins ago";
  else if($seconds < 86400) $time = ($hours==1)?$hours." hour ago":$hours." hours ago";
  else if($seconds < 604800) $time = ($day==1)?$day." day ago":$day." days ago";
  else if($seconds < 2629743) $time = ($week==1)?$week." week ago":$week." weeks ago";
  else if($seconds < 31556926) $time =($months==1)? $months." month ago":$months." months ago";
  else $time = ($year==1)? $year." year ago":$year." years ago";
  return $time; 
  }  



 // uses
 // $post_time="2017-12-05 02:05:12";
 // echo calculate_time_span($post_time); 

Victoria

Answer 18

Many solutions here did not account for rounding. For example:

Event happened at 3pm two days ago. If you are checking at 2pm, it will show one day ago. If you are checking at 4pm it will show two days ago.

If you are working with unix time, this helps:

// how long since event has passed in seconds
$secs = time() - $time_ago;

// how many seconds in a day
$sec_per_day = 60*60*24;

// days elapsed
$days_elapsed = floor($secs / $sec_per_day);

// how many seconds passed today
$today_seconds = date('G')*3600 + date('i') * 60 + date('s');

// how many seconds passed in the final day calculation
$remain_seconds = $secs % $sec_per_day;

if($today_seconds < $remain_seconds)
{
    $days_elapsed++;
}

echo 'The event was '.$days_ago.' days ago.';

It is not perfect if you are worried about leap seconds and daylight savings time.

Quip

Answer 19

I wanted to have dutch version that supported singles and plurals. Just adding an 's' at the end would not suffice, we use completely different words so I rewrote the top answer of this post.

This will result in:

2 jaren 1 maand 2 weken 1 dag 1 minuten 2 seconden

or

1 jaar 2 maanden 1 week 2 dagen 1 minuut 1 seconde

    public function getTimeAgo($full = false){

    $now = new \DateTime;
    $ago = new \DateTime($this->datetime());
    $diff = $now->diff($ago);

    $diff->w = floor($diff->d / 7);
    $diff->d -= $diff->w * 7;

    $string = array(
        'y' => 'jaren',
        'm' => 'maanden',
        'w' => 'weken',
        'd' => 'dagen',
        'h' => 'uren',
        'i' => 'minuten',
        's' => 'seconden',
    );
    $singleString = array(
        'y' => 'jaar',
        'm' => 'maand',
        'w' => 'week',
        'd' => 'dag',
        'h' => 'uur',
        'i' => 'minuut',
        's' => 'seconde',
    );
    // M.O. 2022-02-11 I rewrote this function to support dutch singles and plurals. Added some docs for next programmer to break his brain :)
    // For each possible notation, if corresponding value of current key is true (>1) otherwise remove its key/value from array
    // If the value from current key is 1, use value from $singleString array. Otherwise use value from $string array
    foreach ($string as $k => &$v) {
        if ($diff->$k) {
            if($diff->$k == 1){
                $v = $diff->$k . ' ' . $singleString[$k];
            } else {
                $v = $diff->$k . ' ' . $v;
            }
        } else {
            if($diff->$k == 1){
                unset($singleString[$k]);
            } else {
                unset($string[$k]);
            }
        }
    }

    // If $full = true, print all values.
    // Values have already been filtered with foreach removing keys that contain a 0 as value
    if (!$full) $string = array_slice($string, 0, 1);
    return $string ? implode(', ', $string) . '' : 'zojuist';
}

You should probably test it first because I am not that good of a programmer :)

Schlock

Answer 20

You'll have to take each individual piece of your timestamp, and convert it into Unix time. For example for the timestamp, 2009-09-12 20:57:19.

(((2008-1970)*365)+(8*30)+12)*24+20 would give you a ROUGH estimate of the hours since January 1st, 1970.

Take that number, multiply by 60 and add 57 to get the minutes.

Take that, multiply by 60 and add 19.

That would convert it very roughly and inaccurately however.

Is there any reason you can't just take the normal Unix time to begin with?

Lanfri

is it better to store as a unix time in the sql table? I'm using mysqls automatic timestamp update currently on a timestamp column (which can be changed to unix). I'm just learning what is better? – Prior

Definitely. I believe the default for a mySQL table is the type you referenced, but Unix time is far more practical. You can always store it as an int. – Lanfri

Your database should have a function to convert the date to UNIX format. In mysql you use UNIX_TIMESTAMP(). Oh, and you should generally store your dates as DATETIMEs rather than INTs, so that you can use the sql functions for date manipulation. – Gurgle

You should never, ever use math on time. You're assuming a fixed calendar, which doesn't exist. Use the Date object provided in php to work with... dates. – Carp

Answer 21

There is some issue with some language display time ago for example in Arabic there 3 needed formats to display date. I use this functions in my projects hopefully they can help someone (any suggestion or improvement I'll be apperciate :) )

/**
 *
 * @param   string $date1 
 * @param   string $date2 the date that you want to compare with $date1
 * @param   int $level  
 * @param   bool $absolute  
 */

function app_date_diff( $date1, $date2, $level = 3, $absolute = false ) {

    $date1 = date_create($date1);   
    $date2 = date_create($date2);
    $diff = date_diff( $date1, $date2, $absolute );

    $d = [
        'invert' => $diff->invert
    ];  

    $diffs = [
        'y' => $diff->y, 
        'm' => $diff->m, 
        'd' => $diff->d
    ];

    $level_reached = 0;

    foreach($diffs as $k=>$v) {

        if($level_reached >= $level) {
            break;
        }

        if($v > 0) {
            $d[$k] = $v;
            $level_reached++;
        }

    }

    return  $d;

}

/**
 * 
 */

function date_timestring( $periods, $format = 'latin', $separator = ',' ) {

    $formats = [
        'latin' => [
            'y' => ['year','years'],
            'm' => ['month','months'],
            'd' => ['day','days']
        ],
        'arabic' => [
            'y' => ['سنة','سنتين','سنوات'],
            'm' => ['شهر','شهرين','شهور'],
            'd' => ['يوم','يومين','أيام']
        ]
    ];

    $formats = $formats[$format];

    $string = [];

    foreach($periods as $period=>$value) {

        if(!isset($formats[$period])) {
            continue;
        }

        $string[$period] = $value.' ';
        if($format == 'arabic') {
            if($value == 2) {
                $string[$period] = $formats[$period][1];
            }elseif($value > 2 && $value <= 10) {
                $string[$period] .= $formats[$period][2];
            }else{
                $string[$period] .= $formats[$period][0];
            }

        }elseif($format == 'latin') {
            $string[$period] .= ($value > 1) ? $formats[$period][1] : $formats[$period][0];
        }

    }

    return implode($separator, $string);


}

function timeago( $date ) {

    $today = date('Y-m-d h:i:s');

    $diff = app_date_diff($date,$today,2);

    if($diff['invert'] == 1) {
        return '';
    }

    unset($diff[0]);

    $date_timestring = date_timestring($diff,'latin');

    return 'About '.$date_timestring;

}

$date1 = date('Y-m-d');
$date2 = '2018-05-14';

$diff = timeago($date2);
echo $diff;

Menstruation

Answer 22

If you are using PostgreSQL then it will do the job for you:

const DT_SQL = <<<SQL
WITH lapse AS (SELECT (?::timestamp(0) - now()::timestamp(0))::text t)
SELECT CASE
  WHEN (select t from lapse) ~ '^\s*-' THEN replace((select t from lapse), '-', '') ||' ago' 
  ELSE (select t from lapse) END;
SQL;

function timeSpanText($ts, $conn)
// $ts: date-time string, $conn: PostgreSQL PDO connection
{
 return $conn -> prepare(DT_SQL) -> execute([ts]) -> fetchColumn();
}

Blank

Answer 23

$time_ago = ' ';
$time = time() - $time; // to get the time since that moment
$tokens = array (
31536000 => 'year',2592000 => 'month',604800 => 'week',86400 => 'day',3600 => 'hour',
60  => 'minute',1 => 'second');
foreach ($tokens as $unit => $text) {
if ($time < $unit)continue;
$numberOfUnits = floor($time / $unit);
$time_ago = ' '.$time_ago. $numberOfUnits.' '.$text.(($numberOfUnits>1)?'s':'').'  ';
$time = $time % $unit;}echo $time_ago;

Coverup

Answer 24

Here is my solution please check and modify according your requirements

function getHowLongAgo($date, $display = array('Year', 'Month', 'Day', 'Hour', 'Minute', 'Second'), $ago = '') {
        date_default_timezone_set('Australia/Sydney');
        $timestamp = strtotime($date);
        $timestamp = (int) $timestamp;
        $current_time = time();
        $diff = $current_time - $timestamp;

        //intervals in seconds
        $intervals = array(
            'year' => 31556926, 'month' => 2629744, 'week' => 604800, 'day' => 86400, 'hour' => 3600, 'minute' => 60
        );

        //now we just find the difference
        if ($diff == 0) {
            return ' Just now ';
        }

        if ($diff < 60) {
            return $diff == 1 ? $diff . ' second ago ' : $diff . ' seconds ago ';
        }

        if ($diff >= 60 && $diff < $intervals['hour']) {
            $diff = floor($diff / $intervals['minute']);
            return $diff == 1 ? $diff . ' minute ago ' : $diff . ' minutes ago ';
        }

        if ($diff >= $intervals['hour'] && $diff < $intervals['day']) {
            $diff = floor($diff / $intervals['hour']);
            return $diff == 1 ? $diff . ' hour ago ' : $diff . ' hours ago ';
        }

        if ($diff >= $intervals['day'] && $diff < $intervals['week']) {
            $diff = floor($diff / $intervals['day']);
            return $diff == 1 ? $diff . ' day ago ' : $diff . ' days ago ';
        }

        if ($diff >= $intervals['week'] && $diff < $intervals['month']) {
            $diff = floor($diff / $intervals['week']);
            return $diff == 1 ? $diff . ' week ago ' : $diff . ' weeks ago ';
        }

        if ($diff >= $intervals['month'] && $diff < $intervals['year']) {
            $diff = floor($diff / $intervals['month']);
            return $diff == 1 ? $diff . ' month ago ' : $diff . ' months ago ';
        }

        if ($diff >= $intervals['year']) {
            $diff = floor($diff / $intervals['year']);
            return $diff == 1 ? $diff . ' year ago ' : $diff . ' years ago ';
        }
    }

Thanks

Emendate

Answer 25

# This function prints the difference between two php datetime objects
# in a more human readable form
# inputs should be like strtotime($date)
function humanizeDateDiffference($now,$otherDate=null,$offset=null){
    if($otherDate != null){
        $offset = $now - $otherDate;
    }
    if($offset != null){
        $deltaS = $offset%60;
        $offset /= 60;
        $deltaM = $offset%60;
        $offset /= 60;
        $deltaH = $offset%24;
        $offset /= 24;
        $deltaD = ($offset > 1)?ceil($offset):$offset;      
    } else{
        throw new Exception("Must supply otherdate or offset (from now)");
    }
    if($deltaD > 1){
        if($deltaD > 365){
            $years = ceil($deltaD/365);
            if($years ==1){
                return "last year"; 
            } else{
                return "<br>$years years ago";
            }   
        }
        if($deltaD > 6){
            return date('d-M',strtotime("$deltaD days ago"));
        }       
        return "$deltaD days ago";
    }
    if($deltaD == 1){
        return "Yesterday";
    }
    if($deltaH == 1){
        return "last hour";
    }
    if($deltaM == 1){
        return "last minute";
    }
    if($deltaH > 0){
        return $deltaH." hours ago";
    }
    if($deltaM > 0){
        return $deltaM." minutes ago";
    }
    else{
        return "few seconds ago";
    }
}

Xmas

Answer 26

This function is not made to be used for the English language. I translated the words in English. This needs more fixing before using for English.

function ago($d) {
$ts = time() - strtotime(str_replace("-","/",$d));

        if($ts>315360000) $val = round($ts/31536000,0).' year';
        else if($ts>94608000) $val = round($ts/31536000,0).' years';
        else if($ts>63072000) $val = ' two years';
        else if($ts>31536000) $val = ' a year';

        else if($ts>24192000) $val = round($ts/2419200,0).' month';
        else if($ts>7257600) $val = round($ts/2419200,0).' months';
        else if($ts>4838400) $val = ' two months';
        else if($ts>2419200) $val = ' a month';


        else if($ts>6048000) $val = round($ts/604800,0).' week';
        else if($ts>1814400) $val = round($ts/604800,0).' weeks';
        else if($ts>1209600) $val = ' two weeks';
        else if($ts>604800) $val = ' a week';

        else if($ts>864000) $val = round($ts/86400,0).' day';
        else if($ts>259200) $val = round($ts/86400,0).' days';
        else if($ts>172800) $val = ' two days';
        else if($ts>86400) $val = ' a day';

        else if($ts>36000) $val = round($ts/3600,0).' year';
        else if($ts>10800) $val = round($ts/3600,0).' years';
        else if($ts>7200) $val = ' two years';
        else if($ts>3600) $val = ' a year';

        else if($ts>600) $val = round($ts/60,0).' minute';
        else if($ts>180) $val = round($ts/60,0).' minutes';
        else if($ts>120) $val = ' two minutes';
        else if($ts>60) $val = ' a minute';

        else if($ts>10) $val = round($ts,0).' second';
        else if($ts>2) $val = round($ts,0).' seconds';
        else if($ts>1) $val = ' two seconds';
        else $val = $ts.' a second';


        return $val;
    }

Sallust

Answer 27

Use of:

echo elapsed_time('2016-05-09 17:00:00'); // 18 saat 8 dakika önce yazıldı.

Function:

function elapsed_time($time){// Nekadar zaman geçmiş

        $diff = time() - strtotime($time); 

        $sec = $diff;
        $min = floor($diff/60);
        $hour = floor($diff/(60*60));
        $hour_min = floor($min - ($hour*60));
        $day = floor($diff/(60*60*24));
        $day_hour = floor($hour - ($day*24));
        $week = floor($diff/(60*60*24*7));
        $mon = floor($diff/(60*60*24*7*4));
        $year = floor($diff/(60*60*24*7*4*12));

        //difference calculate to string
        if($sec < (60*5)){
            return 'şimdi yazıldı.';
        }elseif($min < 60){
            return 'biraz önce yazıldı.';
        }elseif($hour < 24){
            return $hour.' saat '.$hour_min.' dakika önce yazıldı.';
        }elseif($day < 7){
            if($day_hour!=0){$day_hour=$day_hour.' saat ';}else{$day_hour='';}
            return $day.' gün '.$day_hour.'önce yazıldı.';
        }elseif($week < 4){
            return $week.' hafta önce yazıldı.';
        }elseif($mon < 12){
            return $mon.' ay önce yazıldı.';
        }else{
            return $year.' yıl önce yazıldı.';
        }
    }

Trumantrumann

a month is longer than 28 days, a year longer than 52 weeks. – Dipody

Answer 28

Slightly modified answer from above:

  $commentTime = strtotime($whatever)
  $today       = strtotime('today');
  $yesterday   = strtotime('yesterday');
  $todaysHours = strtotime('now') - strtotime('today');

private function timeElapsedString(
    $commentTime,
    $todaysHours,
    $today,
    $yesterday
) {
    $tokens = array(
        31536000 => 'year',
        2592000 => 'month',
        604800 => 'week',
        86400 => 'day',
        3600 => 'hour',
        60 => 'minute',
        1 => 'second'
    );
    $time = time() - $commentTime;
    $time = ($time < 1) ? 1 : $time;
    if ($commentTime >= $today || $commentTime < $yesterday) {
        foreach ($tokens as $unit => $text) {
            if ($time < $unit) {
                continue;
            }
            if ($text == 'day') {
                $numberOfUnits = floor(($time - $todaysHours) / $unit) + 1;
            } else {
                $numberOfUnits = floor(($time)/ $unit);
            }
            return $numberOfUnits . ' ' . $text . (($numberOfUnits > 1) ? 's' : '') . ' ago';
        }
    } else {
        return 'Yesterday';
    }
}

Bakst

Answer 29

just pass the date time to this func. it would print out in time ago format for you

date_default_timezone_set('your-time-zone');
function convert($datetime){
  $time=strtotime($datetime);
  $diff=time()-$time;
  $diff/=60;
  $var1=floor($diff);
  $var=$var1<=1 ? 'min' : 'mins';
  if($diff>=60){
    $diff/=60;
    $var1=floor($diff);
    $var=$var1<=1 ? 'hr' : 'hrs';
    if($diff>=24){$diff/=24;$var1=floor($diff);$var=$var1<=1 ? 'day' : 'days';
    if($diff>=30.4375){$diff/=30.4375;$var1=floor($diff);$var=$var1<=1 ? 'month' : 'months';
    if($diff>=12){$diff/=12;$var1=floor($diff);$var=$var1<=1 ? 'year' : 'years';}}}}
    echo $var1,' ',$var,' ago';
  }

Lib

Answer 30

The following is a very simple and extremely efficient solution.

function timeElapsed($originalTime){

        $timeElapsed=time()-$originalTime;

        /*
          You can change the values of the following 2 variables 
          based on your opinion. For 100% accuracy, you can call
          php's cal_days_in_month() and do some additional coding
          using the values you get for each month. After all the
          coding, your final answer will be approximately equal to
          mine. That is why it is okay to simply use the average
          values below.
        */
        $averageNumbDaysPerMonth=(365.242/12);
        $averageNumbWeeksPerMonth=($averageNumbDaysPerMonth/7);

        $time1=(((($timeElapsed/60)/60)/24)/365.242);
        $time2=floor($time1);//Years
        $time3=($time1-$time2)*(365.242);
        $time4=($time3/$averageNumbDaysPerMonth);
        $time5=floor($time4);//Months
        $time6=($time4-$time5)*$averageNumbWeeksPerMonth;
        $time7=floor($time6);//Weeks
        $time8=($time6-$time7)*7;
        $time9=floor($time8);//Days
        $time10=($time8-$time9)*24;
        $time11=floor($time10);//Hours
        $time12=($time10-$time11)*60;
        $time13=floor($time12);//Minutes
        $time14=($time12-$time13)*60;
        $time15=round($time14);//Seconds

        $timeElapsed=$time2 . 'yrs ' . $time5 . 'months ' . $time7 . 
                     'weeks ' . $time9 .  'days ' . $time11 . 'hrs '
                     . $time13 . 'mins and ' . $time15 . 'secs.';

        return $timeElapsed;

}

echo timeElapsed(1201570814);

Sample output:

6yrs 4months 3weeks 4days 12hrs 40mins and 36secs.

Wyeth

Answer 31

Here's my solution for a notification module I built some time ago. It returns output similar to Facebook's notifications dropdown (eg. 1 day ago, Just now, etc).

public function getTimeDifference($time) {
    //Let's set the current time
    $currentTime = date('Y-m-d H:i:s');
    $toTime = strtotime($currentTime);

    //And the time the notification was set
    $fromTime = strtotime($time);

    //Now calc the difference between the two
    $timeDiff = floor(abs($toTime - $fromTime) / 60);

    //Now we need find out whether or not the time difference needs to be in
    //minutes, hours, or days
    if ($timeDiff < 2) {
        $timeDiff = "Just now";
    } elseif ($timeDiff > 2 && $timeDiff < 60) {
        $timeDiff = floor(abs($timeDiff)) . " minutes ago";
    } elseif ($timeDiff > 60 && $timeDiff < 120) {
        $timeDiff = floor(abs($timeDiff / 60)) . " hour ago";
    } elseif ($timeDiff < 1440) {
        $timeDiff = floor(abs($timeDiff / 60)) . " hours ago";
    } elseif ($timeDiff > 1440 && $timeDiff < 2880) {
        $timeDiff = floor(abs($timeDiff / 1440)) . " day ago";
    } elseif ($timeDiff > 2880) {
        $timeDiff = floor(abs($timeDiff / 1440)) . " days ago";
    }

    return $timeDiff;
}

Unconventionality

Answer 32

I am using following function for several years. And it is working fine:

function timeDifference($timestamp)
{
    $otherDate=$timestamp;
    $now=@date("Y-m-d H:i:s");

    $secondDifference=@strtotime($now)-@strtotime($otherDate);
    $extra="";
    if ($secondDifference == 2592000) { 
    // months 
    $difference = $secondDifference/2592000; 
    $difference = round($difference,0); 
    if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; } 
    $difference = $difference." month".$extra." ago"; 
}else if($secondDifference > 2592000)
    {$difference=timestamp($timestamp);} 
elseif ($secondDifference >= 604800) { 
    // weeks 
    $difference = $secondDifference/604800; 
    $difference = round($difference,0); 
    if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; } 
    $difference = $difference." week".$extra." ago"; 
} 
elseif ($secondDifference >= 86400) { 
    // days 
    $difference = $secondDifference/86400; 
    $difference = round($difference,0); 
    if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; } 
    $difference = $difference." day".$extra." ago"; 
} 
elseif ($secondDifference >= 3600) { 
    // hours 

    $difference = $secondDifference/3600; 
    $difference = round($difference,0); 
    if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; } 
    $difference = $difference." hour".$extra." ago"; 
} 
elseif ($secondDifference < 3600) { 
    // hours 
    // for seconds (less than minute)
    if($secondDifference<=60)
    {       
        if($secondDifference==0)
        {
            $secondDifference=1;
        }
        if ($secondDifference>1) { $extra="s"; }
        $difference = $secondDifference." second".$extra." ago"; 

    }
    else
    {

$difference = $secondDifference/60; 
        if ($difference>1) { $extra="s"; }else{$extra="";}
        $difference = round($difference,0); 
        $difference = $difference." minute".$extra." ago"; 
    }
} 

$FinalDifference = $difference; 
return $FinalDifference;
}

Scevor