Days to Seconds Converter

What this converter does

This turns a number of days into seconds. It is the longest reach from a calendar unit down to the base timing unit, so even a single day becomes a large second count. Scripts and duration calculations often want time in seconds, and this gets a day-based span into that form. Enter the days and the seconds come straight back.

How to use it

1. Enter Days. Type the number of days.

Press Calculate and the equivalent in seconds appears.

Where the 86,400 comes from

A day is 24 hours, each hour is 60 minutes, and each minute is 60 seconds. Multiply those together, 24 times 60 times 60, and a day holds 86,400 seconds. So to convert days to seconds you multiply by 86,400. That makes 1 day 86,400 seconds, 2 days 172,800, and half a day 43,200. It is those three familiar steps stacked into one multiply, and the result is exact.

Why turn days into seconds

Seconds are the unit much of software counts in, so a duration that starts life in days sometimes has to be expressed in seconds to be used. Setting a long timeout or expiry, storing a span as a single seconds value, or feeding a calculation that works in seconds all call for the conversion. A one day cache lifetime, for instance, becomes the 86,400 a system expects.

An example

Take 1 day. Multiply by 86,400 and you have 86,400 seconds. Two days is 172,800, and a week, 7 days, is 604,800 seconds. The large figures are simply what a span of days looks like counted one second at a time.

Questions people ask

How many seconds are in a day?

86,400, which is 24 hours times 60 minutes times 60 seconds. So to convert days to seconds you multiply by 86,400.

What is 2 days in seconds?

172,800 seconds, since two lots of 86,400 is 172,800.

How many seconds is a week?

604,800 seconds, which is 7 days times 86,400.

How do I go from seconds back to days?

Divide the seconds by 86,400, or use a seconds-to-days converter.