What are some common pitfalls to avoid when storing and manipulating dates in a PHP application?

One common pitfall to avoid when storing and manipulating dates in a PHP application is not handling time zones properly. It's important to always store dates in a standardized format (like UTC) and convert them to the user's time zone when displaying them. Failure to do so can lead to inconsistencies and errors in date calculations.

// Storing dates in UTC format
$date = new DateTime('2022-01-01 12:00:00', new DateTimeZone('UTC'));
$date->setTimezone(new DateTimeZone('America/New_York'));
echo $date->format('Y-m-d H:i:s');