Data formats
Helsinki Design System suggests formats for commonly presented data to keep Helsinki services more consistent.
Date and time
Format
Helsinki services are recommended to follow the Finnish date and time locale - even if the user is using some other language. Follow these guidelines when presenting date and time in your services.
| Type | Format | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Time (forms, schedules, etc.) | 15:00, 02:00 | When presenting times in forms and schedules, use leading zeros and a colon separator. A 24-hour clock is always used. |
| Time (in text) | 15.00, 2.00 | When presenting times in the written text, use a single dot instead of a colon separator. Leading zeros can be opted out as well. A 24-hour clock is always used. |
| Timer (forms) | 05:00 | When presenting timer in forms that counts down expiration. The time format is mm:ss. |
| Day, month, and year | 24.6.2020 | Date format is D.M.YYYY even if the user's locale is something else than Finnish. Leading zeros are not used for dates. |
| Day, month, and year (longer) | 24. June 2020, 24 June 2020 | Using the written format of the month makes the date easier to understand for different locales. Note that technically English translation omits the dot after day number. |
| Today, tomorrow, yesterday | Today, 12:30 | If talking about today, tomorrow, or yesterday, the written format is used instead of date. |
Ranges
When presenting time or date ranges, consider making information simpler by leaving redundant month and year information out. Note that when presenting ranges, en dash (–) should be used instead of a standard hyphen (-).
| Type | Format | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Time range (forms, schedules, etc.) | 12:30–16:30 | When presenting times in forms and schedules, use leading zeros and a colon separator. |
| Time range (in text) | 12.30–16.30 | When presenting times in the written text, use a single dot instead of a colon separator. |
| Date range | 2.–15. January 2020 / 2.1.–5.2.2020 | Year and/or month can be only written once if both dates share the same year/month. |
Time zones
Automatically use the user's timezone if possible. If not available, default to Finnish time and present the time zone as follows:
| Type | Format | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Time zone | UTC+2 | Leading or trailing zeroes are not recommended to be used for timezones. |
| Time | 15:00 UTC+2 | - |
| Date | 24. June 2020, 15:30 UTC+2 | - |