Create a date column by adding milliseconds to previous date column

[Anonymous]

Hi there!

I am trying to convert some date data that is in a strange format e.g. /Date(1586417537437+0000)/) - i believe this is Microsoft .netJSON or something like that

Basically, the conversion can be done by adding a certain number of milliseconds to a benchmark date of 1/1/1970

I have the number of miliseconds, and I have the benchmark date, both in different columns. Can anyone advise how to add them to get a new date column?

[edhans · Accepted solution]

That is Unix Epoch time I believe, and that timestamp above is from April 9, 2020. You should ignore that +0000. Never convert Unix time with time zones. Always leave it at GMT, then convert it to your local time zone after you have converted it to the normal date/time in the GMT time zone. I explain this in my blog post where I show you how to handle this in Power Query. Let me know if you have any questions.

[Anonymous]

Many thanks - your article solved my problem!