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Convert UTC date as it is to target format

I have date in 2019-12-07T14:55:00.000Z which I want to convert to target format without effecting original value by browser's timezone using momentjs. I tried moment('2019-12-07T14:55:00.000Z').format('MM/DD/YYYY HH:mm'), but it is converting it to 12/07/2019 6:55 (because browser timezone is PST) whereas I expect it to be 12/07/2019 14:55

we can use utc function to prevent moment to use browser's timezone , just like below
moment.utc('2019-12-07T14:55:00.000Z').format('MM/DD/YYYY HH:mm')

MomentJs Format One Day Behind

I have seen a question that is similar to mine (Moment.js sets dates to 1 day behind) but I can't seem to apply it.
Essentially, my date gets parsed like this:
var date = moment("2019-05-27T00:00:00Z"); // date is the 27th
When I format it to get the day, expecting the 27th, I instead receive the 26th!
date.format("DD")
Does anyone know why this might be happening and how to correct it?
http://jsfiddle.net/rmdxj26e/

You must use moment.utc(), the Moment documentation says:
By default, moment parses and displays in local time.
If you want to parse or display a moment in UTC, you can use
moment.utc() instead of moment().
This brings us to an interesting feature of Moment.js. UTC mode.
While in UTC mode, all display methods will display in UTC time
instead of local time.
moment().format(); // 2013-02-04T10:35:24-08:00
moment.utc().format(); // 2013-02-04T18:35:24+00:00
jsFiddle Output:
Live example:
var date = moment.utc("2019-05-27T00:00:00Z");
$('#date').append($('<p>').html(date.format("DD")));
$('#date').append($('<p>').html(date.local().format("DD")));
<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/moment.js/2.24.0/moment.min.js"></script>
<script src="https://cdnjs.cloudflare.com/ajax/libs/jquery/3.3.1/jquery.min.js"></script>
<div id="date"></div>

The problem is the format of the parsed date. The Z letter means it is a "Zulu time" (UTC). I don't know what is your timezone, but the date is converted to your timezone.
You can parse local time format (without Z) and it should display properly.
So the full code with explanation:
var date = moment("2019-05-27T00:00:00"); // date is the 27th in local time
$('#date').append($('<p>').html(date.utc().format("DD"))); // can display 26th or 27th depends on local timezone on the PC
$('#date').append($('<p>').html(date.local().format("DD"))); // is still local so it will be 27th

Alternative to casting UTC Date in Javascript?

I wish to create a new Date in JS, but have it be cast as UTC time. For example, suppose castAsUTC() produces the following desired effect:
var x = new Date('2019-01-01T00:00:00') // In local time (PST)
castAsUTC(x).toISOString(); // => '2019-01-01T00:00:00Z'
// x.toISOString() gives us '2019-01-01T08:00:00Z', which is undesired
Currently, my function looks like this:
function castAsUTC(date) {
return new Date(x.toLocaleString() + '+00:00');
}
Is there a cleaner/nicer way of producing the same effect? Thanks in advance!
EDIT: To be more specific, I'm interested in transforming the date's timezone, without changing its actual value with as little arithmetic as possible. So calling .toISOString() will produce the same date as it is in local time.
I am currently using the moment-timezone library, but I can't seem to get the desired effect using that, either. I would definitely accept an answer that uses Moment.js

You can switch a Moment instance to UTC using the utc function. Then just use format to get whatever the specific output you want from it.

If indeed the string you have is like the one shown, then the easiest thing to do would be to append a Z to indicate UTC.
var input = '2019-01-01T00:00:00';
var date = new Date(input + 'Z');
var output = date.toISOString();
Or, if you would like to use Moment.js, then do this:
var input = '2019-01-01T00:00:00';
var m = moment.utc(input);
var output = m.format();
You do not need moment-timezone for this.

tl;dr;
You formatted the date wrong. Add the letter "Z" to the end of your date string and it will be treated as UTC.
var x = new Date('2019-01-01T00:00:00Z') // Jan 1, 2019 12 AM UTC
These formatting issues are easier to manage with a library like momentjs (utc and format functions) as described in other answers. If you want to use vanilla javascript, you'll need to subtract out the timezone offset before calling toISOString (see warnings in the longer answer below).
Details
Date in javascript deals with timezones in a somewhat counter intuitive way. Internally, the date is stored as the number of milliseconds since the Unix epoch (Jan 1, 1970). That's the number you get when you call getTime() and it's the number that's used for math and comparisons.
However - when you use the standard string formatting functions (toString, toTimeString, toDateString, etc) javascript automatically applies the timezone offset for the local computers timezone before formatting. In a browser, that means it will apply the offset for the end users computer, not the server. The toISOString and toUTCString functions will not apply the offset - they print the actual UTC value stored in the Date. This will probably still look "wrong" to you because it won't match the value you see in the console or when calling toString.
Here's where things really get interesting. You can create Date's in javascript by specifying the number of milliseconds since the Unix epoch using new Date(milliseconds) or by using a parser with either new Date(dateString). With the milliseconds method, there's no timezone to worry about - it's defined as UTC. The question is, with the parse method, how does javascript determine which timezone you intended? Before ES5 (released 2009) the answer was different depending on the browser! Post ES5, the answer depends on how you format the string! If you use a simplified version of ISO 8601 (with only the date, no time), javascript considers the date to be UTC. Otherwise, if you specify the time in ISO 8601 format, or you use a "human readable" format, it considers the date to be local timezone. Check out MDN for more.
Some examples. I've indicated for each if javascript treats it as a UTC or a local date. In UTC, the value would be Jan 1, 1970 at midnight. In local it depends on the timezone. For OP in pacfic time (UTC-8), the UTC value would be Jan 1, 1970 at 8 AM.
new Date(0) // UTC (milliseconds is always UTC)
new Date("1/1/1970"); // Local - (human readable string)
new Date("1970-1-1"); // Local (invalid ISO 8601 - missing leading zeros on the month and day)
new Date("1970-01-01"); // UTC (valid simplified ISO 8601)
new Date("1970-01-01T00:00"); // Local (valid ISO 8601 with time and no timezone)
new Date("1970-01-01T00:00Z"); // UTC (valid ISO 8601 with UTC specified)
You cannot change this behavior - but you can be pedantic about the formats you use to parse dates. In your case, the problem was you provided an ISO-8601 string with the time component but no timezone. Adding the letter "Z" to the end of your string, or removing the time would both work for you.
Or, always use a library like momentjs to avoid these complexities.
Vanilla JS Workaround
As discussed, the real issue here is knowing whether a date will be treated as local or UTC. You can't "cast" from local to UTC because all Date's are UTC already - it's just formatting. However, if you're sure a date was parsed as local and it should really be UTC, you can work around it by manually adjusting the timezone offset. This is referred to as "epoch shifting" (thanks #MattJohnson for the term!) and it's dangerous. You actually create a brand new Date that refers to a different point in time! If you use it in other parts of your code, you can end up with incorrect values!
Here's a sample epoch shift method (renamed from castAsUtc for clarity). First get the timezone offset from the object, then subtract it and create a new date with the new value. If you combine this with toISOString you'll get a date formatted as you wanted.
function epochShiftToUtc(date) {
var timezoneOffsetMinutes = date.getTimezoneOffset();
var timezoneOffsetMill = timezoneOffsetMinutes * 1000 * 60;
var buffer = new Date(date.getTime() - timezoneOffsetMill);
return buffer;
}
epochShiftToUtc(date).toUTCString();

Initialize JS date object from HTML date picker: incorrect date returned

How do you correctly intitialize a timezone-independent date (or I guess a date that is fixed to a single timezone across the html side and the JS side) from a html datepicker?
I have the following simple code, which is producing incorrect dates:
function printDate(){
let d = new Date(document.getElementById("date").value)
alert(d)
}
document.getElementById("printDate").addEventListener("click", e => printDate())
<html>
<body>
Print Date: <br><input type="date" id="date"> <button id="printDate">Add</button>
</body>
</html>
But at least on my computer, currently sitting in U.S. mountain time, it produces incorrect dates. I give it today's date (March 9, 2019), and it alerts yesterday's date in the following format: Fri Mar 08 2019 17:00:00 GMT-0700 (MST). How do I make it not do that?
I really just want it to assume that all input and all output are in GMT.

In a <input type="date" /> element, the selected date is displayed in the locale format, but the value property is always returned in yyyy-mm-dd format, as described in the MDN docs.
In other words, when you choose March 9, 2019, you may see 03/09/2019 from the US or 09/03/2019 in other parts of the world, but value is 2019-03-09 regardless of any time zone or localization settings. This is a good thing, as it allows you to work with the selected date in a standard ISO 8601 format, without trying to apply a time.
However, when you parse a date string in that format with the Date object's constructor (or with Date.parse), you run up against a known issue: The date is not treated as local time, but as UTC. This is the opposite of ISO 8601.
This is described in the MDN docs:
Note: parsing of date strings with the Date constructor (and Date.parse, they are equivalent) is strongly discouraged due to browser differences and inconsistencies. Support for RFC 2822 format strings is by convention only. Support for ISO 8601 formats differs in that date-only strings (e.g. "1970-01-01") are treated as UTC, not local.
It's also in the ECMAScript specification (emphasis mine):
... When the time zone offset is absent, date-only forms are interpreted as a UTC time and date-time forms are interpreted as a local time.
There was a debate about this in 2015, but ultimately it was decided that maintaining compatibility with existing behaviors was more important than being ISO 8601 compliant.
Going back to your question, the best thing to do would be to not parse it into a Date object if you don't need one. In other words:
function printDate(){
const d = document.getElementById("date").value;
alert(d);
}
If you really need a Date object, then the easiest option is to parse the value yourself:
function printDate(){
const parts = document.getElementById("date").value.split('-');
const d = new Date(+parts[0], parts[1]-1, +parts[2], 12);
alert(d);
}
Note the ,12 at the end sets the time to noon instead of midnight. This is optional, but it avoids situations of getting the wrong day when midnight doesn't exist in the local time zone where DST transitions at midnight (Brazil, Cuba, etc.).
Then there's your last comment:
I really just want it to assume that all input and all output are in GMT.
That's a bit different than what you showed. If really that's what you want, then you can construct the Date object as you previously did, and use .toISOString(), .toGMTString(), or .toLocaleString(undefined, {timeZone: 'UTC'})
function printDate(){
const d = new Date(document.getElementById("date").value); // will treat input as UTC
// will output as UTC in ISO 8601 format
alert(d.toISOString());
// will output as UTC in an implementation dependent format
alert(d.toGMTString());
// will output as UTC in a locale specific format
alert(d.toLocaleString(undefined, {timeZone: 'UTC'}));
}

How to parse date string from database without time shift?

I am getting 2016-07-13T00:00:00.000Z string from database and converting it to MM/DD/YYYY format with moment.js like this:
result = moment('2016-07-13T00:00:00.000Z').format('MM/DD/YYYY');
which prints 07/12/2016 but I was expecting 07/13/2016.
Local Linux timezone is America/New_York. date command prints this Mon Jul 4 04:28:19 EDT 2016

The date that you have is in UTC, as signified by the z at the end.
When you use the default moment constructor, moment(), it converts the time you pass it from the specified offset (in this case UTC) to the local time of the machine. This is why your date is changing. Because this is a UTC date, to keep it exactly the same you can use moment.utc():
moment.utc('2016-07-13T00:00:00.000Z').format('MM/DD/YYYY');
"07/13/2016"
Alternately, parseZone would work as well:
moment.parseZone('2016-07-13T00:00:00.000Z').format('MM/DD/YYYY');
"07/13/2016"
For more information about all of the constructor functions in moment, see the parsing guide
or this blog post

You should use momentjs timezone : http://momentjs.com/timezone/
yourdate = moment.tz("2016-07-13T00:00:00.000Z", "America/New_York");
alert(yourdate.format('MM/DD/YYYY'));
This should give you the correct date in output.