How can I convert a datetime object to milliseconds since epoch (unix time) in Python?

It appears to me that the simplest way to do this is

import datetime

epoch = datetime.datetime.utcfromtimestamp(0)

def unix_time_millis(dt):
    return (dt - epoch).total_seconds() * 1000.0

>>> import datetime
>>> # replace datetime.datetime.now() with your datetime object
>>> int(datetime.datetime.now().strftime("%s")) * 1000 
1312908481000

Or the help of the time module (and without date formatting):

>>> import datetime, time
>>> # replace datetime.datetime.now() with your datetime object
>>> time.mktime(datetime.datetime.now().timetuple()) * 1000
1312908681000.0

Answered with help from: http://pleac.sourceforge.net/pleac_python/datesandtimes.html

Documentation:

• time.mktime
• datetime.timetuple

You can use Delorean to travel in space and time!

import datetime
import delorean
dt = datetime.datetime.utcnow()
delorean.Delorean(dt, timezone="UTC").epoch

http://delorean.readthedocs.org/en/latest/quickstart.html  

This is how I do it:

from datetime import datetime
from time import mktime

dt = datetime.now()
sec_since_epoch = mktime(dt.timetuple()) + dt.microsecond/1000000.0

millis_since_epoch = sec_since_epoch * 1000