How to Get Day of Week in JavaScript: Simple Guide

Use the Date object's getDay() method to get the day of the week as a number from 0 (Sunday) to 6 (Saturday). To get the day name, map this number to an array of weekday names.

Syntax

The getDay() method is called on a Date object and returns a number representing the day of the week.

• 0 means Sunday
• 1 means Monday
• ... up to 6 which means Saturday

javascript

const date = new Date();
const dayNumber = date.getDay();

Example

This example shows how to get the current day of the week as a number and as a name.

javascript

const date = new Date();
const dayNumber = date.getDay();
const days = ['Sunday', 'Monday', 'Tuesday', 'Wednesday', 'Thursday', 'Friday', 'Saturday'];
const dayName = days[dayNumber];
console.log('Day number:', dayNumber);
console.log('Day name:', dayName);

Output

Day number: 3
Day name: Wednesday

Common Pitfalls

One common mistake is expecting getDay() to return 1 for Sunday, but it actually returns 0. Another is forgetting that the returned value is a number, so you need to map it to a name if you want the weekday as text.

javascript

const date = new Date('2024-06-30'); // Sunday
console.log(date.getDay()); // Outputs 0, not 1

// Correct way to get name
const days = ['Sunday', 'Monday', 'Tuesday', 'Wednesday', 'Thursday', 'Friday', 'Saturday'];
console.log(days[date.getDay()]); // Outputs 'Sunday'

Output

0
Sunday

Quick Reference

Day Number	Day Name
0	Sunday
1	Monday
2	Tuesday
3	Wednesday
4	Thursday
5	Friday
6	Saturday

Key Takeaways

Use getDay() on a Date object to get the weekday number from 0 (Sunday) to 6 (Saturday).

Map the number from getDay() to an array of day names to get the weekday as text.

Remember Sunday is 0, not 1, which is a common source of confusion.

Always create a Date object before calling getDay() to get the current or specific date's weekday.