How to Calculate the Difference Between Two Time Instances in Go?

Determining Time Differences

You have two time.Time instances, and you need to calculate their difference in hours, minutes, and seconds. Consider the scenarios:

• t1 = "2016-09-09 19:09:16 0530 IST"
  t2 = "2016-09-09 19:09:16 0530 IST"
  (Result: 00:00:00)
• t1 = "2016-09-14 14:12:48 0530 IST"
  t2 = "2016-09-14 14:18:29 0530 IST"
  (Result: 00:05:41)

Solution

To calculate the difference, use the Time.Sub() function. The result is a time.Duration value.

Time.Duration prints itself intelligently:

package main

import (
    "fmt"
    "time"
)

func main() {
    t1 := time.Now()
    t2 := t1.Add(time.Second * 341)

    fmt.Println(t1)
    fmt.Println(t2)

    diff := t2.Sub(t1)
    fmt.Println(diff)
}

Output:

2009-11-10 23:00:00 +0000 UTC
2009-11-10 23:05:41 +0000 UTC
5m41s

For a time format of HH:mm:ss, construct a time.Time value and use its Time.Format() method:

out := time.Time{}.Add(diff)
fmt.Println(out.Format("15:04:05"))

Output:

00:05:41

This works for time differences under 24 hours. For larger differences, consider using a solution that includes days, months, and years.

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