What are common pitfalls when using date validation in PHP forms?

Common pitfalls when using date validation in PHP forms include not properly validating the date format, not accounting for leap years, and not handling different date formats input by users. To solve these issues, it is important to use PHP functions like strtotime() or DateTime::createFromFormat() to validate dates and handle different formats.

// Validate date format and account for leap years
$date = $_POST['date'];

if (strtotime($date) === false) {
    echo "Invalid date format. Please enter a valid date.";
} else {
    $dateObj = DateTime::createFromFormat('Y-m-d', $date);
    if (!$dateObj) {
        echo "Invalid date format. Please enter a valid date in the format YYYY-MM-DD.";
    } else {
        echo "Date is valid: " . $dateObj->format('Y-m-d');
    }
}