type description date store calendar date (yearmonthdayusing the gregorian calendar time store time of day as hoursminutessecondsand microseconds datetime stores both date and time timedelta represents the difference between two datetime values (as dayssecondsand microsecondsconverting between string and datetime datetime objects and pandas timestamp objectswhich 'll introduce latercan be formatted as strings using str or the strftime methodpassing format specificationin [ ]stamp datetime( in [ ]str(stampout[ ] : : in [ ]stamp strftime('% -% -% 'out[ ]'see table - for complete list of the format codes these same format codes can be used to convert strings to dates using datetime strptimein [ ]value 'in [ ]datetime strptime(value'% -% -% 'out[ ]datetime datetime( in [ ]datestrs [''''in [ ][datetime strptime( '% /% /% 'for in datestrsout[ ][datetime datetime( )datetime datetime( )datetime strptime is the best way to parse date with known format howeverit can be bit annoying to have to write format spec each timeespecially for common date formats in this caseyou can use the parser parse method in the third party dateutil packagein [ ]from dateutil parser import parse in [ ]parse(''out[ ]datetime datetime( dateutil is capable of parsing almost any human-intelligible date representationin [ ]parse('jan : pm'out[ ]datetime datetime( in international localesday appearing before month is very commonso you can pass dayfirst=true to indicate thisin [ ]parse(''dayfirst=trueout[ ]datetime datetime( date and time data types and tools www it-ebooks info