Difference in months between two dates

Question

How to calculate the difference in months between two dates in C#?

Is there is equivalent of VB's DateDiff() method in C#. I need to find difference in months between two dates that are years apart. The documentation says that I can use TimeSpan like:

TimeSpan ts = date1 - date2;

but this gives me data in Days. I don't want to divide this number by 30 because not every month is 30 days and since the two operand values are quite apart from each other, I am afraid dividing by 30 might give me a wrong value.

Any suggestions?

Answer 1

Here is a comprehensive solution to return a DateTimeSpan, similar to a TimeSpan, except that it includes all the date components in addition to the time components.

Usage:

void Main()
{
    DateTime compareTo = DateTime.Parse("8/13/2010 8:33:21 AM");
    DateTime now = DateTime.Parse("2/9/2012 10:10:11 AM");
    var dateSpan = DateTimeSpan.CompareDates(compareTo, now);
    Console.WriteLine("Years: " + dateSpan.Years);
    Console.WriteLine("Months: " + dateSpan.Months);
    Console.WriteLine("Days: " + dateSpan.Days);
    Console.WriteLine("Hours: " + dateSpan.Hours);
    Console.WriteLine("Minutes: " + dateSpan.Minutes);
    Console.WriteLine("Seconds: " + dateSpan.Seconds);
    Console.WriteLine("Milliseconds: " + dateSpan.Milliseconds);
}

Outputs:

Years: 1
Months: 5
Days: 27
Hours: 1
Minutes: 36
Seconds: 50
Milliseconds: 0

For convenience, I've lumped the logic into the DateTimeSpan struct, but you may move the method CompareDates wherever you see fit. Also note, it doesn't matter which date comes before the other.

public struct DateTimeSpan
{
    public int Years { get; }
    public int Months { get; }
    public int Days { get; }
    public int Hours { get; }
    public int Minutes { get; }
    public int Seconds { get; }
    public int Milliseconds { get; }

    public DateTimeSpan(int years, int months, int days, int hours, int minutes, int seconds, int milliseconds)
    {
        Years = years;
        Months = months;
        Days = days;
        Hours = hours;
        Minutes = minutes;
        Seconds = seconds;
        Milliseconds = milliseconds;
    }

    enum Phase { Years, Months, Days, Done }

    public static DateTimeSpan CompareDates(DateTime date1, DateTime date2)
    {
        if (date2 < date1)
        {
            var sub = date1;
            date1 = date2;
            date2 = sub;
        }

        DateTime current = date1;
        int years = 0;
        int months = 0;
        int days = 0;

        Phase phase = Phase.Years;
        DateTimeSpan span = new DateTimeSpan();
        int officialDay = current.Day;

        while (phase != Phase.Done)
        {
            switch (phase)
            {
                case Phase.Years:
                    if (current.AddYears(years + 1) > date2)
                    {
                        phase = Phase.Months;
                        current = current.AddYears(years);
                    }
                    else
                    {
                        years++;
                    }
                    break;
                case Phase.Months:
                    if (current.AddMonths(months + 1) > date2)
                    {
                        phase = Phase.Days;
                        current = current.AddMonths(months);
                        if (current.Day < officialDay && officialDay <= DateTime.DaysInMonth(current.Year, current.Month))
                            current = current.AddDays(officialDay - current.Day);
                    }
                    else
                    {
                        months++;
                    }
                    break;
                case Phase.Days:
                    if (current.AddDays(days + 1) > date2)
                    {
                        current = current.AddDays(days);
                        var timespan = date2 - current;
                        span = new DateTimeSpan(years, months, days, timespan.Hours, timespan.Minutes, timespan.Seconds, timespan.Milliseconds);
                        phase = Phase.Done;
                    }
                    else
                    {
                        days++;
                    }
                    break;
            }
        }

        return span;
    }
}

Answer 2

  var dt1 = (DateTime.Now.Year * 12) + DateTime.Now.Month;
  var dt2 = (DateTime.Now.AddMonths(-13).Year * 12) + DateTime.Now.AddMonths(-13).Month;
  Console.WriteLine(dt1);
  Console.WriteLine(dt2);
  Console.WriteLine((dt1 - dt2));

Answer 3

This worked for what I needed it for. The day of month didn't matter in my case because it always happens to be the last day of the month.

public static int MonthDiff(DateTime d1, DateTime d2){
    int retVal = 0;

    if (d1.Month<d2.Month)
    {
        retVal = (d1.Month + 12) - d2.Month;
        retVal += ((d1.Year - 1) - d2.Year)*12;
    }
    else
    {
        retVal = d1.Month - d2.Month;
        retVal += (d1.Year - d2.Year)*12;
    }
    //// Calculate the number of years represented and multiply by 12
    //// Substract the month number from the total
    //// Substract the difference of the second month and 12 from the total
    //retVal = (d1.Year - d2.Year) * 12;
    //retVal = retVal - d1.Month;
    //retVal = retVal - (12 - d2.Month);

    return retVal;
}

Answer 4

Use Noda Time:

LocalDate start = new LocalDate(2013, 1, 5);
LocalDate end = new LocalDate(2014, 6, 1);
Period period = Period.Between(start, end, PeriodUnits.Months);
Console.WriteLine(period.Months); // 16

(example source)

Answer 5

You can use the DateDiff class of the Time Period Library for .NET:

// ----------------------------------------------------------------------
public void DateDiffSample()
{
  DateTime date1 = new DateTime( 2009, 11, 8, 7, 13, 59 );
  DateTime date2 = new DateTime( 2011, 3, 20, 19, 55, 28 );
  DateDiff dateDiff = new DateDiff( date1, date2 );

  // differences
  Console.WriteLine( "DateDiff.Months: {0}", dateDiff.Months );
  // > DateDiff.Months: 16

  // elapsed
  Console.WriteLine( "DateDiff.ElapsedMonths: {0}", dateDiff.ElapsedMonths );
  // > DateDiff.ElapsedMonths: 4

  // description
  Console.WriteLine( "DateDiff.GetDescription(6): {0}", dateDiff.GetDescription( 6 ) );
  // > DateDiff.GetDescription(6): 1 Year 4 Months 12 Days 12 Hours 41 Mins 29 Secs
} // DateDiffSample

Answer 6

You can have a function something like this.

For Example, from 2012/12/27 to 2012/12/29 becomes 3 days. Likewise, from 2012/12/15 to 2013/01/15 becomes 2 months, because up to 2013/01/14 it's 1 month. from 15th it's 2nd month started.

You can remove the "=" in the second if condition, if you do not want to include both days in the calculation. i.e, from 2012/12/15 to 2013/01/15 is 1 month.

public int GetMonths(DateTime startDate, DateTime endDate)
{
    if (startDate > endDate)
    {
        throw new Exception("Start Date is greater than the End Date");
    }

    int months = ((endDate.Year * 12) + endDate.Month) - ((startDate.Year * 12) + startDate.Month);

    if (endDate.Day >= startDate.Day)
    {
        months++;
    }

    return months;
}