diff --git a/sql/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/PartitioningUtils.scala b/sql/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/PartitioningUtils.scala
index 472bf82d3604..379acb67f7c7 100644
--- a/sql/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/PartitioningUtils.scala
+++ b/sql/core/src/main/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/PartitioningUtils.scala
@@ -407,6 +407,34 @@ object PartitioningUtils {
       Literal(bigDecimal)
     }
 
+    val dateTry = Try {
+      // try and parse the date, if no exception occurs this is a candidate to be resolved as
+      // DateType
+      DateTimeUtils.getThreadLocalDateFormat.parse(raw)
+      // SPARK-23436: Casting the string to date may still return null if a bad Date is provided.
+      // This can happen since DateFormat.parse  may not use the entire text of the given string:
+      // so if there are extra-characters after the date, it returns correctly.
+      // We need to check that we can cast the raw string since we later can use Cast to get
+      // the partition values with the right DataType (see
+      // org.apache.spark.sql.execution.datasources.PartitioningAwareFileIndex.inferPartitioning)
+      val dateValue = Cast(Literal(raw), DateType).eval()
+      // Disallow DateType if the cast returned null
+      require(dateValue != null)
+      Literal.create(dateValue, DateType)
+    }
+
+    val timestampTry = Try {
+      val unescapedRaw = unescapePathName(raw)
+      // try and parse the date, if no exception occurs this is a candidate to be resolved as
+      // TimestampType
+      DateTimeUtils.getThreadLocalTimestampFormat(timeZone).parse(unescapedRaw)
+      // SPARK-23436: see comment for date
+      val timestampValue = Cast(Literal(unescapedRaw), TimestampType, Some(timeZone.getID)).eval()
+      // Disallow TimestampType if the cast returned null
+      require(timestampValue != null)
+      Literal.create(timestampValue, TimestampType)
+    }
+
     if (typeInference) {
       // First tries integral types
       Try(Literal.create(Integer.parseInt(raw), IntegerType))
@@ -415,16 +443,8 @@ object PartitioningUtils {
         // Then falls back to fractional types
         .orElse(Try(Literal.create(JDouble.parseDouble(raw), DoubleType)))
         // Then falls back to date/timestamp types
-        .orElse(Try(
-          Literal.create(
-            DateTimeUtils.getThreadLocalTimestampFormat(timeZone)
-              .parse(unescapePathName(raw)).getTime * 1000L,
-            TimestampType)))
-        .orElse(Try(
-          Literal.create(
-            DateTimeUtils.millisToDays(
-              DateTimeUtils.getThreadLocalDateFormat.parse(raw).getTime),
-            DateType)))
+        .orElse(timestampTry)
+        .orElse(dateTry)
         // Then falls back to string
         .getOrElse {
           if (raw == DEFAULT_PARTITION_NAME) {
diff --git a/sql/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/ParquetPartitionDiscoverySuite.scala b/sql/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/ParquetPartitionDiscoverySuite.scala
index d4902641e335..edb3da904d10 100644
--- a/sql/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/ParquetPartitionDiscoverySuite.scala
+++ b/sql/core/src/test/scala/org/apache/spark/sql/execution/datasources/parquet/ParquetPartitionDiscoverySuite.scala
@@ -1120,4 +1120,18 @@ class ParquetPartitionDiscoverySuite extends QueryTest with ParquetTest with Sha
           Row(3, BigDecimal("2" * 30)) :: Nil)
     }
   }
+
+  test("SPARK-23436: invalid Dates should be inferred as String in partition inference") {
+    withTempPath { path =>
+      val data = Seq(("1", "2018-01", "2018-01-01-04", "test"))
+        .toDF("id", "date_month", "date_hour", "data")
+
+      data.write.partitionBy("date_month", "date_hour").parquet(path.getAbsolutePath)
+      val input = spark.read.parquet(path.getAbsolutePath).select("id",
+        "date_month", "date_hour", "data")
+
+      assert(input.schema.sameType(input.schema))
+      checkAnswer(input, data)
+    }
+  }
 }