I noticed that Magento stores product creation and modification timestamps in the database. When I check the catalog_product_entity table in MySQL, I can see there are two columns called ‘created_at’ and ‘updated_at’ that contain this information.
I want to display these dates on my store’s product pages so customers can see when items were first added and when they were last updated. What’s the best way to pull this data from the database and show it on the frontend? Do I need to modify template files or create custom attributes?
Any guidance on the proper approach would be helpful since I’m not sure if there are built-in methods for accessing these timestamps or if I need to write custom code.
You don’t need database queries for this - Magento’s product methods already handle it. Just use $product->getCreatedAt() and $product->getUpdatedAt() in your product templates. These grab the raw datetime strings straight from the database. You’ll need to format them with Magento’s datetime helper or PHP’s date functions before showing them on the frontend. I’d drop this code into your product view template (catalog/product/view.phtml) and wrap the timestamps in HTML with CSS classes for styling. This way you’re working with Magento’s framework instead of fighting it, so updates won’t break your code.
interesting idea! But won’t showing really old creation dates make ur products look outdated to customers? That could hurt sales. Also, does Magento cache these timestamps? I’m wondering if it updates the modified date every time you make small inventory tweaks. You might want to test this on a few products first to see how it affects SEO and customer behavior.
What timezone do these timestamps use? Does Magento store them in UTC or your local store time? Also - do product imports or bulk updates change the original created_at dates? I’d check a few imported products to see if they show actual creation dates or just the import time.
Try a custom module with an observer pattern. I used this when I needed timestamps showing across multiple product templates without hardcoding each file. Set up an observer that listens to catalog product load events, then inject the formatted timestamp into the product’s additional data array. You get way more control over when and how timestamps show up - super useful for conditional display based on customer groups or store views. The observer handles all datetime formatting in one place, so everything stays consistent across your catalog. Just reference these values in any template using the product’s getData method. This scales much better than template modifications when you’re managing multiple stores or changing themes frequently.
You could also modify the product detail block directly instead of messing with templates. Just override the product view block class and add your custom methods to grab timestamps, then call them from your phtml files. This way you keep logic separate from presentation and can reuse it across different themes without touching core template files every time.
just edit your product view template directly. add <?php echo date('M j, Y', strtotime($product->getCreatedAt())); ?> wherever you want the date to show up. skip the complex modules unless you’re doin something fancy. back up your template file first in case it breaks!