PHP date yesterday [duplicate]

date() itself is only for formatting, but it accepts a second parameter.

date("F j, Y", time() - 60 * 60 * 24);

To keep it simple I just subtract 24 hours from the unix timestamp.

A modern oop-approach is using DateTime

$date = new DateTime();
$date->sub(new DateInterval('P1D'));
echo $date->format('F j, Y') . "\n";

Or in your case (more readable/obvious)

$date = new DateTime();
$date->add(DateInterval::createFromDateString('yesterday'));
echo $date->format('F j, Y') . "\n";

(Because DateInterval is negative here, we must add() it here)

See also: DateTime::sub() and DateInterval