How do I use PHP to get the current year?

You can use either date or strftime. In this case I'd say it doesn't matter as a year is a year, no matter what (unless there's a locale that formats the year differently?)

For example:

<?php echo date("Y"); ?>

On a side note, when formatting dates in PHP it matters when you want to format your date in a different locale than your default. If so, you have to use setlocale and strftime. According to the php manual on date:

To format dates in other languages, you should use the setlocale() and strftime() functions instead of date().

From this point of view, I think it would be best to use strftime as much as possible, if you even have a remote possibility of having to localize your application. If that's not an issue, pick the one you like best.

<?php echo date("Y"); ?>

My super lazy version of showing a copyright line, that automatically stays updated:

&copy; <?php 
$copyYear = 2008; 
$curYear = date('Y'); 
echo $copyYear . (($copyYear != $curYear) ? '-' . $curYear : '');
?> Me, Inc.

This year (2008), it will say:

© 2008 Me, Inc.

Next year, it will say:

© 2008-2009 Me, Inc.

and forever stay updated with the current year.

Or (PHP 5.3.0+) a compact way to do it using an anonymous function so you don't have variables leaking out and don't repeat code/constants:

© 
<?php call_user_func(function($y){$c=date('Y');echo $y.(($y!=$c)?'-'.$c:'');}, 2008); ?> 
Me, Inc.

http://us2.php.net/date

echo date('Y');

strftime("%Y");

I love strftime. It's a great function for grabbing/recombining chunks of dates/times.

Plus it respects locale settings which the date function doesn't do.

This one gives you the local time:

$year = date('Y'); // 2008

And this one UTC:

$year = gmdate('Y'); // 2008

print date('Y');

For more information, check date() function documentation: https://secure.php.net/manual/en/function.date.php

Just write:

date("Y") // A full numeric representation of a year, 4 digits
          // Examples: 1999 or 2003

Or:

date("y"); // A two digit representation of a year     Examples: 99 or 03

And 'echo' this value...

use a PHP date() function.

and the format is just going to be Y. Capital Y is going to be a four digit year.

<?php echo date("Y"); ?>

$dateYear = date('Y');
echo "Current Year: $dateYear";

Current Year: 2022

$dateYear = date('y');
echo $dateYear;

22

To get the current year using PHP’s date function, you can pass in the “Y” format character like so:

//Getting the current year using
//PHP's date function.

$year = date("Y");
echo $year;

The example above will print out the full 4-digit representation of the current year.

If you only want to retrieve the 2-digit format, then you can use the lowercase “y” format character:

$year = date("y");
echo $year;
1
2
$year = date("y");
echo $year;

The snippet above will print out 20 instead of 2020, or 19 instead of 2019, etc.

My way to show the copyright, That keeps on updating automatically

<p class="text-muted credit">Copyright &copy;
    <?php
        $copyYear = 2017; // Set your website start date
        $curYear = date('Y'); // Keeps the second year updated
        echo $copyYear . (($copyYear != $curYear) ? '-' . $curYear : '');
    ?> 
</p>    

It will output the results as

copyright @ 2017   //if $copyYear is 2017 
copyright @ 2017-201x    //if $copyYear is not equal to Current Year.

best shortcode for this section:

<?= date("Y"); ?>

$year = date("Y", strtotime($yourDateVar));

In Laravel

$date = Carbon::now()->format('Y');
return $date;

In PHP

echo date("Y");

in my case the copyright notice in the footer of a wordpress web site needed updating.

thought simple, but involved a step or more thann anticipated.

1. Open footer.php in your theme's folder.

2. Locate copyright text, expected this to be all hard coded but found:

   <div id="copyright">
       <?php the_field('copyright_disclaimer', 'options'); ?>
   </div>
   

3. Now we know the year is written somewhere in WordPress admin so locate that to delete the year written text. In WP-Admin, go to Options on the left main admin menu:

   Then on next page go to the tab Disclaimers:

   and near the top you will find Copyright year:

   DELETE the © symbol + year + the empty space following the year, then save your page with Update button at top-right of page.

4. With text version of year now delete, we can go and add our year that updates automatically with PHP. Go back to chunk of code in STEP 2 found in footer.php and update that to this:

   <div id="copyright">
       &copy;<?php echo date("Y"); ?> <?php the_field('copyright_disclaimer', 'options'); ?>
   </div>
   

5. Done! Just need to test to ensure changes have taken effect as expected.

this might not be the same case for many, however we've come across this pattern among quite a number of our client sites and thought it would be best to document here.

Print current month with M, day with D and year with Y.

<?php echo date("M D Y"); ?>

For more pricise in second param in date function strtotime return the timestamp passed by param

// This work when you get time as string
echo date('Y', strtotime("now"));

// Get next years
echo date('Y', strtotime("+1 years"));

// 
echo strftime("%Y", strtotime("now"));

With datetime class

echo (new DateTime)->format('Y');

create a helper function and call it

getCurrentYear();

function getCurrentYear(){
    return now()->year;
}

If you are using the Carbon PHP API extension for DateTime, you can achieve it easy:

<?php echo Carbon::now()->year; ?>