How to add a time interval to an NSDate?

Question

I have an NSDate and a duration. I need to get the time after the duration

Given:
The date is "2010-02-24 12:30:00 -1000"
duration is 3600 secs

I need to get "2010-02-24 13:30:00 -1000"

I thought dateWithTimeIntervalSinceReferenceDate:, would do the trick but I see now that this gives a date offset from 1 Jan 2001 GMT.

Is there another C function I need to use

Answer 1

As DyingCactus states, you can use the addTimeInterval method of NSDate, but depending on the OS version is will create a compiler warning, since it is deprecated in 10.6 as of 2009-08-17.

The current recommended method is to use dateByAddingTimeInterval on NSDate:

NSDate *newDate = [oldDate dateByAddingTimeInterval:3600];

Note that if you are targeting 10.5 or earlier, the original answer will work.

Answer 2

You want the class method dateWithTimeInterval:sinceDate: which takes the starting date and the interval NSDate docs

Answer 3

You can use the addTimeInterval instance method of NSDate:

NSDate *newDate = [oldDate addTimeInterval:3600];

Edit: As Chip Coons correctly points out, this method has been deprecated. Please use one of the other methods instead.

Answer 4

For those looking for a Swift 3.x version:

let newDate = Date.init(timeInterval: 2600, since: oldDate)

Answer 5

Instead of using the deprecated addTimeInterval method, you can use the newer dateByAddingTimeInterval instance method of NSDate.

NSDate *newDate = [oldDate dateByAddingTimeInterval:2500];