# To timestamp transform


You can use the transform To Timestamp to change the data type of a numeric or string column into timestamp, so that it can be stored with that data type or applied to other transforms that require a timestamp.

**To add a To Timestamp transform:**

1. Navigate to your visual ETL job in Amazon SageMaker Unified Studio.

1. Choose the plus icon to open the **Add nodes** menu.

1. Under **Transforms**, choose **To Timestamp**.

1. Select the diagram to add the node to your visual ETL job.

1. Select the node on the diagram to view details about the transform.

1. Under **Column to convert**, select the column that you want to convert.

1. Under **Time format**, define how to parse the column selected by choosing the format.

   If the value is a number, it can be expressed in seconds (Unix/Python timestamp), milliseconds, or microseconds.

   If the value is a formatted string, choose the "iso" type. The string needs to conform to one of the variants of the ISO format, for example: “2022-11-02T14:40:59.915Z“.

   If you don’t know the type at this point or different rows use different types, then you can choose ”autodetect“ and the system will make its best guess, with a small performance cost.

1. Under **Column name**, enter a name for a new column that will be generated for the timestamps. If a column name is not specified, the existing column will be replaced instead of generating a new column.