Java 8 – Find the Day of the Week for a Given Date

Introduction

Java 8 introduced the java.time package, which provides a modern and comprehensive framework for handling date and time. One common task is determining the day of the week for a specific date. This can be useful in various scenarios, such as scheduling, logging, or simply displaying the day of the week in a user interface.

In this guide, we’ll explore how to find the day of the week for a given date using Java 8’s java.time package.

Table of Contents

• Problem Statement
• Solution Steps
• Java Program
  • Find the Day of the Week
• Advanced Considerations
• Conclusion

Problem Statement

The task is to create a Java program that:

• Takes a date as input.
• Determines the day of the week for that date.

Example:

• Input: A LocalDate object representing 2024-08-28.
• Output: The day of the week, such as WEDNESDAY.

Solution Steps

1. Create a LocalDate Object: Represent the date for which you want to find the day of the week.
2. Use the getDayOfWeek() Method: Call this method on the LocalDate object to retrieve the day of the week.
3. Handle the Result: The method returns a DayOfWeek enum, which you can then process or display.

Java Program

Find the Day of the Week

The following example demonstrates how to find the day of the week for a given date in Java 8.

import java.time.LocalDate;
import java.time.DayOfWeek;

/**
 * Java 8 - Find the Day of the Week for a Given Date
 * Author: https://www.rameshfadatare.com/
 */
public class DayOfWeekExample {

    public static void main(String[] args) {
        // Step 1: Create a LocalDate object for the desired date
        LocalDate date = LocalDate.of(2024, 8, 28);

        // Step 2: Get the day of the week
        DayOfWeek dayOfWeek = date.getDayOfWeek();

        // Step 3: Display the day of the week
        System.out.println("The day of the week for " + date + " is " + dayOfWeek);
    }
}

Output

The day of the week for 2024-08-28 is WEDNESDAY

Explanation

• LocalDate.of(2024, 8, 28) creates a LocalDate instance for the specified date.
• getDayOfWeek() returns a DayOfWeek enum that represents the day of the week.
• The output shows the day of the week for the given date, in this case, WEDNESDAY.

Advanced Considerations

• Locale-Specific Day Names: If you need to display the day of the week in a specific language or format, you can use the getDisplayName() method from the DayOfWeek enum with a TextStyle and Locale.

• Date Input: You can accept the date input in various formats, such as String, and parse it into a LocalDate using DateTimeFormatter.

• Immutability and Thread Safety: LocalDate and DayOfWeek are immutable and thread-safe, making them suitable for use in multi-threaded environments.

Conclusion

This guide covers how to find the day of the week for a given date in Java 8 using the java.time package. The process is straightforward and leverages the modern date and time API, ensuring that your Java applications can easily determine and display the day of the week for any date. Whether for scheduling, logging, or user interface purposes, this operation is a common and essential task in many applications.