diff --git a/src/caoscrawler/converters.py b/src/caoscrawler/converters.py
index a2ad1df474158e463f1499ac49b43adf614c6559..de399e2677cf35a036c87f36f13c9a5b016f8a53 100644
--- a/src/caoscrawler/converters.py
+++ b/src/caoscrawler/converters.py
@@ -1117,5 +1117,6 @@ class DateElementConverter(TextElementConverter):
         if matches is not None and "date" in matches:
             matches.update({"date": datetime.datetime.strptime(
                 matches["date"],
-                self.definition["date_format"]).date()})
+                self.definition["date_format"] if "date_format" in self.definition else "%Y-%m-%d"
+            ).date()})
         return matches
diff --git a/unittests/test_converters.py b/unittests/test_converters.py
index 83ebaf543de9390ba9907c6fdb67d544b9cc5eb8..d7d1c9bb150476331c854f6e371789282879dfec 100644
--- a/unittests/test_converters.py
+++ b/unittests/test_converters.py
@@ -575,11 +575,20 @@ def test_match_debug(converter_registry, capsys):
 
 def test_date_converter():
     dictconverter = DateElementConverter(
-        definition={"match_value": "(?P<date>.*)",
-                    "date_format": "%Y-%m-%d"},
+        definition={"match_value": "(?P<date>.*)"},
         name="conv",
         converter_registry=converter_registry)
     matches = dictconverter.match(TextElement("text", "2022-11-11"))
     assert "date" in matches
     assert isinstance(matches["date"], datetime.date)
     assert matches["date"].year == 2022
+
+    dictconverter = DateElementConverter(
+        definition={"match_value": "(?P<date>.*)",
+                    "date_format": "%y-%m-%d"},
+        name="conv",
+        converter_registry=converter_registry)
+    matches = dictconverter.match(TextElement("text", "22-11-11"))
+    assert "date" in matches
+    assert isinstance(matches["date"], datetime.date)
+    assert matches["date"].year == 2022