How to get the current Unix timestamp in code

JavaScript counts in milliseconds, and Date.now() returns them directly. Divide by 1000 and round down with Math.floor for seconds, and pass the millisecond form of the example to new Date().

const seconds = Math.floor(Date.now() / 1000) // seconds
const milliseconds = Date.now() // milliseconds
const iso = new Date(1780511400000).toISOString() // 2026-06-03T18:30:00.000Z

Python counts in seconds, and time.time() returns them as a float, so int() gives whole seconds. For milliseconds, use time.time_ns() // 1_000_000, and always pass tz=timezone.utc to fromtimestamp(), because without it you get a naive datetime in the platform's local time.

import time
from datetime import datetime, timezone
seconds = int(time.time())  # seconds
milliseconds = time.time_ns() // 1_000_000  # milliseconds
date = datetime.fromtimestamp(1780511400, tz=timezone.utc)  # June 3, 2026 at 18:30:00 UTC

PHP counts in seconds, and time() returns them directly. microtime(true) returns the current time as a float in seconds, so multiplying by 1000 and casting to int gives milliseconds.

<?php
$seconds = time(); // seconds
$milliseconds = (int) (microtime(true) * 1000); // milliseconds
$date = gmdate('Y-m-d H:i:s', 1780511400); // June 3, 2026 at 18:30:00 UTC

Go counts in seconds with Unix() and in milliseconds with UnixMilli() (Time.Unix, Time.UnixMilli). Skip UnixNano unless you need nanoseconds, because its result is undefined for dates before the year 1678 or after 2262.

now := time.Now()
seconds := now.Unix() // seconds
milliseconds := now.UnixMilli() // milliseconds
date := time.Unix(1780511400, 0).UTC().Format(time.RFC3339) // 2026-06-03T18:30:00Z

PostgreSQL counts in seconds. EXTRACT returns numeric from version 14 on, with fractions of a second, so FLOOR and a bigint cast give whole seconds. to_timestamp() goes the other way and returns a timestamp with time zone. Don't feed it an epoch taken from a plain timestamp column, because PostgreSQL warns that the result assumes the original value was in UTC.

SELECT FLOOR(EXTRACT(EPOCH FROM clock_timestamp()))::bigint; -- seconds
SELECT FLOOR(EXTRACT(EPOCH FROM clock_timestamp()) * 1000)::bigint; -- milliseconds
SELECT to_timestamp(1780511400) AT TIME ZONE 'UTC'; -- June 3, 2026 at 18:30:00 UTC

MySQL counts in seconds from UNIX_TIMESTAMP(), which returns 0 for a date outside its range, and that range ends in 2038 on 32-bit platforms and goes past the year 3000 on 64-bit ones. FROM_UNIXTIME() shows its result in the session time zone, so the output changes with the connection's setting.

SELECT UNIX_TIMESTAMP(); -- seconds
SELECT ROUND(UNIX_TIMESTAMP(NOW(3)) * 1000); -- milliseconds
SELECT FROM_UNIXTIME(1780511400); -- June 3, 2026 at 18:30:00 when the session uses UTC

Store the value as a UTC integer or in a native timestamp column, and convert it at the edge, where a person reads it. Put the unit in the field name too, like created_at_ms, so nobody has to guess what the number counts.