Get the Current Year in Kotlin

When working with Kotlin for Android development, you might come across scenarios where you need to retrieve the current year. In this article, we will explore different ways to obtain the current year using Kotlin. Let's dive right in!

Using java.util.Calendar

One straightforward approach is to utilize the java.util.Calendar class, which provides various functionalities for date and time manipulation. To get the current year, you can use the following code snippet:

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1import java.util.Calendar
2
3val calendar = Calendar.getInstance()
4val currentYear = calendar.get(Calendar.YEAR)

In the above example, we create an instance of the Calendar class using the getInstance() method. Then, we retrieve the current year by calling the get(Calendar.YEAR) method.

Using java.time.LocalDate (API Level 26+)

Starting from API Level 26 (Android Oreo) and above, you can also utilize the java.time.LocalDate class, which belongs to the modern Date and Time API introduced in Java 8. Here's an example of how to get the current year using this approach:

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1import java.time.LocalDate
2
3val currentDate = LocalDate.now()
4val currentYear = currentDate.year

By calling now() on LocalDate, we obtain the current date, and then we extract the year component using the year property.

Using SimpleDateFormat (Legacy Approach)

If you're targeting older versions of Android that do not support the modern Date and Time API, you can resort to SimpleDateFormat, which is a legacy class available in Android. Here's an example:

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1import java.text.SimpleDateFormat
2import java.util.Date
3
4val currentDate = Date()
5val yearFormat = SimpleDateFormat("yyyy")
6val currentYear = yearFormat.format(currentDate)

In the above code, we create a new instance of Date to represent the current date. Then, we define a SimpleDateFormat object with the desired format ("yyyy" for the year). Finally, we use the format() method to obtain the current year as a formatted string.

Wrapping Up

Obtaining the current year in Kotlin for Android development is relatively straightforward. In this article, we explored three different approaches using java.util.Calendar, java.time.LocalDate, and SimpleDateFormat. Depending on your target API level and requirements, you can choose the method that best suits your needs.