How to Rename Files Using the Date and Time Format

[SoCu]

Hi, I've been looking at other posts and can't seem to change anything—just delete the first few characters—and I can't find the formula to format the file names. I was wondering if you could tell me how to do it.

I have files captured with my camera—some are images and others are videos. The image files start with the letters IMGxxxxx, and the videos start with VIDxxxxx.
The digits following those letters correspond to the year, month, day, hour, minutes, and seconds.

The files would look like this:

VID20260625135210.mp4
IMG20260625135206.jpg
IMG20260625135016.jpg
VID20260625134723.mp4
VID20260625134208.mp4
IMG20260625134737.jpg
IMG20260625124813.jpg

What I'm trying to do is remove the first three characters and replace the following numbers with the date and time, using this format

2026-06-25 13-52-10.mp4
2026-06-25 13-52-06.jpg
2026-06-25 13-50-16.jpg
2026-06-25 13-47-23.mp4
2026-06-25 13-42-08.mp4
2026-06-25 13-47-37.jpg
2026-06-25-12-48-13.jpg

I'm trying this out, but I can't seem to get anything to work:

Remove (5):
First n: 3

RegEx(1)
Match: (\d\d\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)(\h\h) (\m\m) (\s\s)
Replace: \1-\2-\3 \4-\5\6
Activar: v2

What code would I need to use to do that?

Thank you.

[therube]

You've basically got it, except you used h m s rather then \d.


1:Regex, v2

Code: Select all

Match: (\d\d\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)
Replace: \1-\2-\3 \4-\5-\6


5:Remove, First: 3


---


Alternatively, with Regex alone:
1:Regex, v2

Code: Select all

Match: (...)(\d\d\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)(\d\d)
Replace: \2-\3-\4 \5-\6-\7


(...) will match the first 3-chars, & you simply do not include that in the Replace: (i.e., \1)

[SoCu]

therube, it works now! Regular expressions are driving me crazy, haha.

Thank you so much.

[SoCu]

I'm trying to rename the file using the date shown in the “Date” column of Windows File Explorer, but I can't get it to change.

I've tried the “Name(2) Reformat Date” option, but I can't figure out how to do it, I don't see any change in the file name, even when I leave the box blank to use the default format (YYYY-MM-DD), and the file name still doesn't change.

I’ve also tried “Auto Date(8),” but the filename doesn’t change the way I want it to. For example:
2026-06-25 13-52-10.jpg



In Windows File Explorer, I only have the “Date” column. There are other columns like “Creation Date” and “Modification Date,” but sometimes the dates don’t match, which is why I’ve selected the column labeled simply “Date,” since it aligns better with the dates of the files I want to sort. However, I see that this column doesn’t appear in BRU.

There may be other times when the file name includes a specific name that I want to keep, so I’d like the date to be displayed first, as in the previous example, followed by the name I want to keep. For example:

2026-06-25 13-52-10 Madrid, Prado National Museum.jpg

[therube]

8:Auto Date
Mode: Prefix (or whatever works for you)
Type: Modified (Current)
Fmt: Custom
Custom: %Y-%M-%d - (spacing, dashes, whatever works for you)

[SoCu]

Okay, thanks. I haven't been able to edit the post to make the image smaller, but I see now that I was entering that information incorrectly in the Custom section.

To take it a step further, I'm not sure if this is possible, but some files have text or names that could be modified to change the filename based on the date, while retaining certain names, for example.

name name.jpg
name name text 1.jpg
name name text 2.jpg
name name text 3.jpg
name name.jpg

Renombrado a:
2026-07-07 18:18.jpg
2026-07-07 18:20 texto 1.jpg
2026-07-07 18:22 texto 2.jpg
2026-07-07 18:24 texto 3.jpg
2026-07-07 18:26.jpg