description: Formats built-in Hugo dates---`.Date`, `.PublishDate`, and `.Lastmod`---according to Go's layout string.
date: 2017-02-01
publishdate: 2017-02-01
lastmod: 2017-02-01
categories: [functions]
menu:
docs:
parent: "functions"
keywords: [dates,time]
signature: [".Format FORMAT"]
workson: [times]
hugoversion:
relatedfuncs: [dateFormat,now,Unix,time]
deprecated: false
aliases: []
toc: true
---
`.Format` will format date values defined in your front matter and can be used as a property on the following [page variables][pagevars]:
*`.PublishDate`
*`.Date`
*`.Lastmod`
Assuming a key-value of `date: 2017-03-03` in a content file's front matter, your can run the date through `.Format` followed by a layout string for your desired output at build time:
```
{{ .PublishDate.Format "January 2, 2006" }} => March 3, 2017
```
For formatting *any* string representations of dates defined in your front matter, see the [`dateFormat` function][dateFormat], which will still leverage the Go layout string explained below but uses a slightly different syntax.
## Go's Layout String
Hugo templates [format your dates][time] via layout strings that point to a specific reference time:
```
Mon Jan 2 15:04:05 MST 2006
```
While this may seem arbitrary, the numerical value of `MST` is `07`, thus making the layout string a sequence of numbers.
Here is a visual explanation [taken directly from the Go docs][gdex]:
```
Jan 2 15:04:05 2006 MST
=> 1 2 3 4 5 6 -7
```
### Hugo Date and Time Templating Reference
The following examples show the layout string followed by the rendered output.
Ordinal abbreviations (i.e., with shorted suffixes like "1st", "2nd", and "3rd") are not currently directly supported. By using `{{.Date.Format "Jan 2nd 2006"}}`, Hugo assumes you want to append `nd` as a string to the day of the month. However, you can chain functions together to create something like this:
{{ .Date.Format "2" }}{{ if in (slice 1 21 31) .Date.Day}}st{{ else if in (slice 2 22) .Date.Day}}nd{{ else if in (slice 3 23) .Date.Day}}rd{{ else }}th{{ end }} of {{ .Date.Format "January 2006" }}
