PHP Seasons

A lightweight PHP utility class that returns the season from a given date. Supports meteorological and astronomical season calculations, northern and southern hemispheres, and custom season names for translations.

Installation

composer require jaybizzle/php-seasons

Quick Start

use Jaybizzle\Seasons;

// Get the current season
$season = new Seasons;
$season->season(); // e.g. "Spring"

// Get season for a specific date
$season->season('1st June'); // "Summer"

// Static convenience methods
Seasons::now();          // e.g. "Spring"
Seasons::for('1st June'); // "Summer"

Season Calculation Methods

By default, seasons are calculated using meteorological boundaries based on whole calendar months:

Season	Months
Winter	December, January, February
Spring	March, April, May
Summer	June, July, August
Autumn	September, October, November

Astronomical Seasons

You can switch to astronomical season boundaries, which use approximate equinox and solstice dates:

Season	Approximate Dates
Spring	March 20 - June 20
Summer	June 21 - September 22
Autumn	September 23 - December 21
Winter	December 22 - March 19

$season = new Seasons;

$season->season('March 19');                // "Winter" (meteorological: March = Spring)
$season->astronomical()->season('March 19'); // "Winter" (astronomical: before equinox)
$season->astronomical()->season('March 21'); // "Spring" (astronomical: after equinox)

The astronomical calculation adjusts automatically for leap years.

Southern Hemisphere

Seasons in the southern hemisphere are reversed. Use the southern() method to get the correct season:

$season = new Seasons;

$season->season('July');              // "Summer"
$season->southern()->season('July');  // "Winter"

This works with astronomical mode too:

$season->astronomical()->southern()->season('March 25'); // "Autumn"

Immutable Fluent API

The astronomical() and southern() methods return a new instance, leaving the original unchanged. This means you can safely reuse the same base instance:

$season = new Seasons;

$northern = $season->season('July');              // "Summer"
$southern = $season->southern()->season('July');   // "Winter"
$original = $season->season('July');               // Still "Summer"

Month Ranges

Get the month numbers that belong to a given season:

$season = new Seasons;

$season->monthRange('Winter'); // [12, 1, 2]
$season->monthRange('Summer'); // [6, 7, 8]

// Southern hemisphere month ranges
$season->southern()->monthRange('Summer'); // [12, 1, 2]

Translations

Pass an array of four season names to the constructor in the order: winter, spring, summer, autumn. All output will use your custom names:

// French
$season = new Seasons(['Hiver', 'Printemps', 'Été', 'Automne']);
$season->season('June');        // "Été"
$season->season('January');     // "Hiver"
$season->monthRange('Été');     // [6, 7, 8]

// German
$season = new Seasons(['Winter', 'Frühling', 'Sommer', 'Herbst']);
$season->season('October');     // "Herbst"

// Japanese
$season = new Seasons(['冬', '春', '夏', '秋']);
$season->season('April');       // "春"

Translations work with all features including southern(), astronomical(), and monthRange():

$french = new Seasons(['Hiver', 'Printemps', 'Été', 'Automne']);
$french->southern()->season('June');                // "Hiver"
$french->astronomical()->season('March 21');        // "Printemps"

The static methods also accept translations:

Seasons::for('June', ['Hiver', 'Printemps', 'Été', 'Automne']); // "Été"
Seasons::now(['Hiver', 'Printemps', 'Été', 'Automne']);          // e.g. "Printemps"

Date Formats

Any date string parsable by PHP's strtotime() is accepted:

$season = new Seasons;

$season->season('June');               // "Summer"
$season->season('1st October 2016');   // "Autumn"
$season->season('2024-12-25');         // "Winter"
$season->season('next Friday');        // depends on current date

An Exception is thrown if the date string cannot be parsed.

API Reference

Method	Returns	Description
new Seasons(?array $names)	Seasons	Create instance, optionally with custom season names
season(?string $date)	string	Get season for date (or current date if null)
astronomical()	Seasons	New instance using astronomical boundaries
southern()	Seasons	New instance using southern hemisphere
monthRange(string $season)	array	Get month numbers for a season
Seasons::now(?array $names)	string	Static: get current season
Seasons::for(string $date, ?array $names)	string	Static: get season for a date

Constants

Seasons::SEASON_WINTER // "Winter"
Seasons::SEASON_SPRING // "Spring"
Seasons::SEASON_SUMMER // "Summer"
Seasons::SEASON_AUTUMN // "Autumn"

License

MIT