How do I break down an NSTimeInterval into year, months, days, hours, minutes and seconds on iPhone?

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Brief Description

  1. Just another approach to complete the answer of JBRWilkinson but adding some code. It can also offers a solution to Alex Reynolds’s comment.

  2. Use NSCalendar method:

    • (NSDateComponents *)components:(NSUInteger)unitFlags fromDate:(NSDate *)startingDate toDate:(NSDate *)resultDate options:(NSUInteger)opts

    • “Returns, as an NSDateComponents object using specified components, the difference between two supplied dates”. (From the API documentation).

  3. Create 2 NSDate whose difference is the NSTimeInterval you want to break down. (If your NSTimeInterval comes from comparing 2 NSDate you don’t need to do this step, and you don’t even need the NSTimeInterval, just apply the dates to the NSCalendar method).

  4. Get your quotes from NSDateComponents

Sample Code

// The time interval 
NSTimeInterval theTimeInterval = ...;

// Get the system calendar
NSCalendar *sysCalendar = [NSCalendar currentCalendar];

// Create the NSDates
NSDate *date1 = [[NSDate alloc] init];
NSDate *date2 = [[NSDate alloc] initWithTimeInterval:theTimeInterval sinceDate:date1]; 

// Get conversion to months, days, hours, minutes
NSCalendarUnit unitFlags = NSHourCalendarUnit | NSMinuteCalendarUnit | NSDayCalendarUnit | NSMonthCalendarUnit;

NSDateComponents *breakdownInfo = [sysCalendar components:unitFlags fromDate:date1  toDate:date2  options:0];
NSLog(@"Break down: %i min : %i hours : %i days : %i months", [breakdownInfo minute], [breakdownInfo hour], [breakdownInfo day], [breakdownInfo month]);

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