How to JSON stringify a javascript Date and preserve timezone

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Assuming you have some kind of object that contains a Date:

var o = { d : new Date() };

You can override the toJSON function of the Date prototype. Here I use moment.js to create a moment object from the date, then use moment’s format function without parameters, which emits the ISO8601 extended format including the offset.

Date.prototype.toJSON = function(){ return moment(this).format(); }

Now when you serialize the object, it will use the date format you asked for:

var json = JSON.stringify(o);  //  '{"d":"2015-06-28T13:51:13-07:00"}'

Of course, that will affect all Date objects. If you want to change the behavior of only the specific date object, you can override just that particular object’s toJSON function, like this:

o.d.toJSON = function(){ return moment(this).format(); }

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