What is the purpose of todate in MySQL?

In MySQL, the todate function is used to convert a string into date type data. It takes two parameters: the string to be converted and the date format.

For example, if you have a string ‘2021-01-01’ representing a date, you can use the todate function to convert it to date type data. By specifying the format string ‘%Y-%m-%d’, MySQL will parse the string into the corresponding date type, which can then be used in queries.

Example:
SELECT CONVERT(‘2021-01-01’, ‘date’) AS converted_date;
Output: 2021-01-01

This way, you can perform various date operations on the converted date, such as calculating date differences, sorting, and more.