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Extract Dates from Text

The date extractor finds dates in text across the formats people actually use: ISO 8601, slash and dot separated numeric dates, and long forms such as "5 August 2026" or "August 5, 2026". Results can be normalised to ISO format for sorting.

Options
Text to scan 0 characters
Dates

Your result will appear here.

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Results update automatically and are calculated on your device. Nothing you type is sent to a server.

Runs in your browser. Processing happens entirely in your browser. Nothing you enter is sent to Delimiter.live.

How to use the Date Extractor

  1. Paste text containing dates.
  2. Set whether ambiguous numeric dates should be read day-first or month-first.
  3. Leave normalisation on to get sortable ISO dates.
  4. Copy or download the list.

Example

Input
Due 05/08/2026, signed 1 July 2026.
Output
2026-08-05
2026-07-01

Common use cases

  • Building a timeline from a document or a set of notes.
  • Extracting dates from log entries for a chronology.
  • Normalising mixed date formats before importing data.

Limitations and things to watch for

  • Numeric dates such as 05/08/2026 are genuinely ambiguous — that is 5 August in the UK and 8 May in the US. The day-first option controls the interpretation; ISO dates and long-form dates are never ambiguous and ignore the setting.
  • Only English month names are recognised in long-form dates.
  • Relative expressions such as "next Tuesday" or "in three weeks" are not dates in a machine-readable sense and are not matched.
  • Dates that do not exist, such as 31 February, are rejected during normalisation.

Frequently asked questions

How does it handle 05/08/2026?
It depends on the day-first setting. With it on, that is 5 August 2026; with it off, 8 May 2026. Numeric dates are inherently ambiguous, which is exactly why ISO 8601 exists.
Which formats are recognised?
ISO 8601 dates and datetimes, numeric dates separated by slashes, hyphens or dots, and long-form English dates such as "5 August 2026" and "August 5, 2026", with or without an ordinal suffix.
Why is normalisation useful?
ISO 8601 dates sort correctly as plain text, so a normalised list can be sorted with the line sorter or pasted into a spreadsheet without a parsing step.

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