FORMAT

Example

Format a date value into a specified string representation.

DECLARE @d DATETIME = ’12/01/2018′;
SELECT FORMAT (@d, ‘d’, ‘en-US’) AS ‘US English Result’,
FORMAT (@d, ‘d’, ‘no’) AS ‘Norwegian Result’,
FORMAT (@d, ‘d’, ‘zu’) AS ‘Zulu Result’;

Definition and Usage

The FORMAT() function in SQL Server 2017 and later formats a value according to a specified format string (and optionally, a culture).

Use FORMAT() for formatting date/time and number values. For other data type conversions, consider using CAST() or CONVERT().

Syntax

FORMAT(value, format, culture)

Parameter Values

Parameter	Description
value	Mandatory. Specifies the value that will undergo formatting.
format	Mandatory. Specifies the format pattern used for formatting the value.
culture	Optional. Specifies a culture for formatting purposes, available from SQL Server 2017 onward.

Technical Details

Works in:

SQL Server (from 2012 onward) and Azure SQL Database

More Examples

Example

Format a numerical value into a desired string representation.

SELECT FORMAT(123456789, ‘##-##-#####’);