diff --git a/r/R/dplyr-funcs-datetime.R b/r/R/dplyr-funcs-datetime.R
index 04c0214fdfb..234f0bda872 100644
--- a/r/R/dplyr-funcs-datetime.R
+++ b/r/R/dplyr-funcs-datetime.R
@@ -148,4 +148,28 @@ register_bindings_datetime <- function() {
     !call_binding("am", x)
   })
 
+  register_binding("ymd", function(x) {
+    format_map <-
+      list(
+        ymd_hyphen1 = "%Y-%m-%d",
+        ymd_hyphen2 = "%y-%m-%d",
+        ymd_hyphen3 = "%Y-%B-%d",
+        ymd_hyphen4 = "%y-%B-%d",
+        ymd_hyphen5 = "%Y-%b-%d",
+        ymd_hyphen6 = "%y-%b-%d"
+      )
+
+    x <- call_binding("gsub", "[^A-Za-z0-9]", "-", x)
+
+    # call_binding(
+    #   "coalesce",
+      call_binding("strptime", x, format = format_map[[1]], unit = "s")#,
+    #   call_binding("strptime", x, format = format_map[[2]], unit = "s"),
+    #   call_binding("strptime", x, format = format_map[[3]], unit = "s"),
+    #   call_binding("strptime", x, format = format_map[[4]], unit = "s"),
+    #   call_binding("strptime", x, format = format_map[[5]], unit = "s"),
+    #   call_binding("strptime", x, format = format_map[[6]], unit = "s")
+    # )
+
+  })
 }
diff --git a/r/tests/testthat/test-dplyr-funcs-datetime.R b/r/tests/testthat/test-dplyr-funcs-datetime.R
index a7a705678c1..549c51dc357 100644
--- a/r/tests/testthat/test-dplyr-funcs-datetime.R
+++ b/r/tests/testthat/test-dplyr-funcs-datetime.R
@@ -711,3 +711,56 @@ test_that("am/pm mirror lubridate", {
   )
 
 })
+
+test_that("date/time parsing / ymd() and `-` separator", {
+  test_dates <- tibble::tibble(
+    string_ymd = c(
+      "2021-09-10", "2021/09/10", "2021.09.10", "2021,09,10", "2021:09:10", "2021 09 10",
+      # "21-09-10",
+      # "21/09/10",
+      # "21.09.10",
+      # "21,09,10",
+      # "21:09:10",
+      # "20210910",
+      # "210910",
+      # "2021 Sep 10",
+      # "2021 September 10",
+      # "21 Sep 10",
+      # "21 September 10",
+      NA
+    ),
+    string_dmy = c(
+      "10-09-2021", "10/09/2021", "10.09.2021", "10,09,2021", "10:09:2021", "10 09 2021",
+      # "10-09-21", "10/09/21",
+      # "10.09.21", "10,09,21", "10:09:21",
+      # "10092021",
+      # "100921",
+      # "10 Sep 2021",
+      # "10 September 2021",
+      # "10 Sep 21",
+      # "10 September 21",
+      NA
+    ),
+    string_mdy = c(
+      "09-10-2021", "09/10/2021", "09.10.2021", "09,10,2021", "09:10:2021", "09 10 2021",
+      # "09-10-21", "09/10/21",
+      # "09.10.21", "09,10,21", "09:10:21",
+      # "09102021",
+      # "091021",
+      # "Sep 10 2021",
+      # "September 10 2021",
+      # "Sep 10 21",
+      # "September 10 21",
+      NA
+    ),
+    date = c(rep(as.Date("2021-09-10"), 6), NA),
+    date_midnight = c(rep(as.POSIXct("2021-09-10 00:00:00", tz = "UTC"), 6), NA)
+  )
+
+  compare_dplyr_binding(
+    .input %>%
+      mutate(x = ymd(string_ymd)) %>%
+      collect(),
+    test_dates
+  )
+})