---
id: hightime
version: "1.0.0"
license: MIT
license_treatment: permissive
maintenance: active
---

# hightime — Hightime Python API

License: permissive · Maintenance: active · Downloads: 135.2K/mo

## What it is and what it does

Hightime extends Python's time-handling capabilities by replacing the standard datetime and timedelta types with versions that preserve precision down to yoctoseconds. This allows developers working in scientific, engineering, or precision-timing domains to perform arithmetic and store timestamps without losing sub-microsecond information. The package maintains the familiar API of the standard library—constructors, operators, and string representations work as expected—but internally tracks time at much finer granularity.

The package is designed for scenarios where microsecond precision is insufficient: femtosecond-scale measurements, nanosecond-precision instrumentation, or any domain requiring sub-microsecond temporal resolution. It supports all standard datetime operations (addition, subtraction, comparison) and integrates cleanly into existing Python code that imports from hightime instead of the standard library.

Use it for:

- Scientific instrumentation and measurement systems requiring sub-microsecond timestamp precision
- High-frequency trading or financial systems tracking events at femtosecond or nanosecond scales
- Physics simulations or quantum computing frameworks needing extreme temporal precision
- Precision timing analysis in embedded systems or real-time control applications
- Research data logging where microsecond granularity causes unacceptable information loss

## Worth the install?

AI-flagged interpretation of the facts above — verify before relying.

Hightime provides drop-in replacements for Python's datetime and timedelta types that support precision down to yoctoseconds, enabling sub-microsecond time arithmetic and representation.

Yes, if your domain requires sub-microsecond time precision. The package is actively maintained, has no dependencies, installs cleanly, carries a permissive license, and provides a familiar API. Install only if you actually need precision beyond microseconds; standard datetime is simpler and faster for typical applications.

## Install

pip install hightime
uv add hightime
poetry add hightime

## Installing hightime

Before you install: Low friction installation as a pure-Python wheel with no runtime dependencies. Actively maintained with recent commits and broad Python version support (3.9–3.13, CPython and PyPy).

License in practice: MIT license permits both non-commercial and commercial use without restriction, making it suitable for proprietary or open-source projects.

Quickstart:

pip install hightime

from hightime import datetime, timedelta

high_noon = datetime(year=1952, month=7, day=24, hour=12, minute=0, second=30)
hesitation = timedelta(microseconds=10, femtoseconds=203456)
reaction = high_noon + hesitation
print(reaction)  # 1952-07-24 12:00:30.000010000203456

Verify before relying:

- Performance overhead compared to standard datetime for typical use cases
- Memory footprint of high-precision time objects vs. built-in types
- Compatibility with third-party libraries expecting standard datetime objects

## Package facts

- License: MIT (permissive)
- Python support: supports_current
- Install friction: low
- Maintenance: active
- Downloads: 135.2K/month (top 15,000 on PyPI)
- Known vulnerabilities: none known

## Tags

high precision datetime, yoctosecond precision timing, sub-microsecond timedelta, extended precision time arithmetic, femtosecond datetime support, nanosecond precision time, scientific computing timestamps, precision-timing, scientific-computing

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