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# first_time()

> Get the first timestamp from a counter aggregate

<Icon icon="tag" iconType="duotone" /> Since [1.11.0][toolkit-1.11.0]

Get the first timestamp from a counter aggregate.

## Samples

Get the first and last point of each daily counter aggregate.

```sql theme={"dark"}
WITH t as (
  SELECT
      time_bucket('1 day'::interval, ts) as dt,
      counter_agg(ts, val) AS cs -- get a CounterSummary
  FROM table
  GROUP BY time_bucket('1 day'::interval, ts)
)
SELECT
    dt,
    first_time(cs) -- extract the timestamp of the first point in the CounterSummary
    last_time(cs) -- extract the timestamp of the last point in the CounterSummary
FROM t;
```

## Arguments

The syntax is:

```sql theme={"dark"}
first_time(
    cs CounterSummary
) RETURNS TIMESTAMPTZ
```

| Name | Type             | Default | Required | Description                                                     |
| ---- | ---------------- | ------- | -------- | --------------------------------------------------------------- |
| `cs` | `CounterSummary` | -       | ✔        | A counter aggregate produced using [`counter_agg`][counter-agg] |

## Returns

| Column      | Type        | Description                                               |
| ----------- | ----------- | --------------------------------------------------------- |
| first\_time | TIMESTAMPTZ | The timestamp of the first point in the counter aggregate |

[counter-agg]: /api-reference/timescaledb-toolkit/counters-and-gauges/counter_agg/counter_agg

[toolkit-1.11.0]: https://github.com/timescale/timescaledb-toolkit/releases/tag/1.11.0