Format functions

format()
Cypher 25 onlyIntroduced in Neo4j 2025.09

The format() function creates dynamically formatted string representations of temporal instance and duration types.

Details

Syntax

format(value[, pattern])

Description

Returns the temporal value as an ISO-formatted STRING or as a STRING formatted by the provided pattern.

Arguments

Name

Type

Description

value

DATE | LOCAL TIME | ZONED TIME | LOCAL DATETIME | ZONED DATETIME | DURATION

A temporal value to be formatted.

pattern

STRING

A pattern used to format the temporal value. If the pattern is not provided the value will be formatted according to ISO 8601.

Returns

STRING
Considerations

The output format can be customized via the pattern parameter.

The pattern parameter follows the Java DateTimeFormatter.

If no pattern is specified, the function returns an ISO-formatted string.

Most characters yield a different output when they are repeated.

Some characters cannot be applied to certain types, for instance, u cannot be used to construct a string for a LOCAL TIME because it represents a year which is not part of the temporal value.

Any character that is not reserved, other than [, ], {, }, #, and ', are output directly. To ensure future compatibility it is recommended to wrap all characters that you want to output directly with single quotes.

Instance types

Cypher®'s instance types are DATE, LOCAL TIME, ZONED TIME, LOCAL DATETIME and ZONED DATETIME. For more information, see Values and types → temporal instants.

Use the characters in String pattern characters to create a string pattern for instance types.

Examples

Example 1. Instance formatting, US American and European dates
Query
WITH datetime('1986-11-18T6:04:45.123456789+01:00[Europe/Berlin]') AS dt
RETURN format(dt, "MM/dd/yyyy") AS US, format(dt, "dd/MM/yyyy") AS EU
Result
US EU

"11/18/1986"

"18/11/1986"

Rows: 1
Example 2. Instance formatting with day-of-week, month-of-year, day-of-month, era and year
Query
WITH datetime('1986-11-18T6:04:45.123456789+01:00[Europe/Berlin]') AS dt
RETURN format(dt, "EEEE, MMMM d, G uuuu") AS instanceString
Result
instanceString

"Tuesday, November 18, AD 1986"

Rows: 1

Four occurrences of E and M (text presentations) output the full form of the day and month.

Example 3. Instance formatting with day-of-year and localized day-of-week
Query
WITH datetime('1986-11-18T6:04:45.123456789+01:00[Europe/Berlin]') AS dt
RETURN format(dt, "DDD'nd day of the year,' c'rd day of the week'") AS instanceString
Result
instanceString

"322nd day of the year, 3rd day of the week"

Rows: 1
Example 4. Instance formatting with clock-hour-of-day (1-24), minute-of-hour and time-zone name
Query
WITH datetime('1986-11-18T6:04:45.123456789+01:00[Europe/Berlin]') AS dt
RETURN format(dt, "k:mm z") AS CET, format(dt, "K:mm O") AS GMT
Result
CET GMT

"6:04 CET"

"6:04 GMT+1"

Rows: 1
Example 5. Instance formatting with month-of-year, day-of-month, milli-of-day, minute-of-hour and second-of-minute
Query
WITH datetime('1986-11-18T6:04:45.123456789+01:00[Europe/Berlin]') AS dt
RETURN format(dt, "LLL d,' minute 'm', second 's', millisecond of the day 'A") AS instanceString
Result
instanceString

"Nov 18, minute 4, second 45, millisecond of the day 21885123"

Rows: 1

Three occurrences of L (number/text presentation) output the short form ("Nov").

Example 6. Instance formatting with pad next and week-based-year
Query
WITH datetime('1986-11-18T6:04:45.123456789+01:00[Europe/Berlin]') AS dt
RETURN format(dt, "pppYY") AS instanceString
Result
instanceString

" 86"

Rows: 1

The three occurrences of p add one space character of padding to the two digit form output by two occurrences of Y.

String pattern characters

Allowed characters for instance type string patterns
Character Meaning Presentation Examples

G

era

text

AD; Anno Domini; A

u

year

year

2004; 04

y

year-of-era

year

2004; 04

D

day-of-year

number

189

M / L

month-of-year

number/text

7; 07; Jul; July; J

d

day-of-month

number

10

g

modified-julian-day

number

2451334

Q / q

quarter-of-year

number/text

3; 03; Q3; 3rd quarter

Y

week-based-year

year

1996; 96

w

week-of-week-based-year

number

27

W

week-of-month

number

4

E

day-of-week

text

Tue; Tuesday; T

e / c

localized day-of-week

number/text

2; 02; Tue; Tuesday; T

F

aligned-week-of-month

number

3

a

am-pm-of-day

text

PM

B

period-of-day

text

in the morning

h

clock-hour-of-am-pm (1-12)

number

12

K

hour-of-am-pm (0-11)

number

0

k

clock-hour-of-day (1-24)

number

24

H

hour-of-day (0-23)

number

0

m

minute-of-hour

number

30

s

second-of-minute

number

55

S

fraction-of-second

fraction

978

A

milli-of-day

number

1234

n

nano-of-second

number

987654321

N

nano-of-day

number

1234000000

V

time-zone ID

zone-id

America/Los_Angeles; Z; -08:30

v

generic time-zone name

zone-name

Pacific Time; PT

z

time-zone name

zone-name

Pacific Standard Time; PST

O

localized zone-offset

offset-O

GMT+8; GMT+08:00; UTC-08:00

X

zone-offset 'Z' for zero

offset-X

Z; -08; -0830; -08:30; -083015; -08:30:15

x

zone-offset

offset-x

+0000; -08; -0830; -08:30; -083015; -08:30:15

Z

zone-offset

offset-Z

+0000; -0800; -08:00

p

pad next

pad modifier

1

"

escape for text

delimiter

'

single quote

literal

Duration types

Use the characters in String pattern characters to create a string pattern for duration types.

Cypher’s duration type DURATION has components and component groups. For more information, see see Values and types → components of durations.

If the string pattern contains a character from a component group but does not contain a character denoting a longer duration from the same group, format() converts the longer duration to the equivalent duration with the character that is present. For example a missing y (year) will be converted to four quarters, if q is present in the string pattern. This is because without a reference point, there is no way to determine the specifics of a duration.

Examples

Example 7. Duration formatting, years converted to quarters
Query
WITH duration({years: 1, months: 4}) AS d
RETURN format(d, "y 'years' q 'quarters' M 'months'") AS withYears, format(d, "q 'quarters' M 'months'") AS withoutYears
Result
withYears withoutYears

"1 years 1 quarters 1 months"

"5 quarters 1 months"

Rows: 1
Example 8. Duration formatting, weeks converted to days
Query
WITH duration({weeks: 3, days: 4}) AS d
RETURN format(d, "w 'weeks' d 'days'") AS withWeeks, format(d, "d 'days'") AS withoutWeeks
Result
withWeeks withoutWeeks

"3 weeks 4 days"

"25 days"

Rows: 1
Example 9. Duration formatting, hours converted to minutes
Query
WITH duration({days: 4, hours: 5, minutes: 6, seconds: 7}) AS d
RETURN format(d, "h 'hours' m 'minutes'") AS withHours, format(d, "m 'minutes'") AS withoutHours
Result
withHours withoutHours

"5 hours 6 minutes"

"306 minutes"

Rows: 1

Note how the four days cannot be converted to hours or minutes and do not affect the query result. Days are in a different component group than hours and minutes, see Allowed characters for a duration type string pattern.

String pattern characters

Allowed characters for a duration type string pattern
Component Group Characters Presentation

Months

y / Y/ u

years

q / Q

quarters

M / L

months

Days

w / W

weeks

d / D

days

Seconds

h / H / k / K

hours

m

minutes

s

seconds

n / S

fraction-of-second

A

milliseconds

N

nanoseconds