Python Error – AttributeError: type object ‘datetime.datetime’ has no attribute ‘datetime’ (2 Examples)

In this tutorial, I’ll illustrate how to deal with the AttributeError: type object ‘datetime.datetime’ has no attribute ‘datetime’ in Python programming.

Example 1: Replicating the Error Message – AttributeError: type object ‘datetime.datetime’ has no attribute ‘datetime’

To reproduce the error message, we have to load the datetime module as you can see below:

from datetime import datetime              # Load datetime

If we afterwards want to work with the datetime function, we get the following output:

date_x1 = datetime.datetime(2018, 2, 7)    # Trying to apply datetime function
# AttributeError: type object 'datetime.datetime' has no attribute 'datetime'

Example 2: Fixing the Error Message – AttributeError: type object ‘datetime.datetime’ has no attribute ‘datetime’

To fix the problem, we have to use “import datetime” instead of “from datetime import datetime”:

import datetime                            # Load datetime module

Now we can properly use the datetime function.

date_x1 = datetime.datetime(2018, 2, 7)    # Application of datetime function works fine
print(date_x1)
# 2018-02-07 00:00:00

Note: This article was created in collaboration with Matthias Bäuerlen. Matthias is a programmer who helps to create tutorials on the Python programming language. You might find more info about Matthias and his other articles on his profile page.