Operators

➕Operators➖

An operator is a symbol that operates on a value or a variable. For example: + is an operator to perform addition.

C has a wide range of operators to perform various operations.

1. C Arithmetic Operators:-

An arithmetic operator performs mathematical operations such as addition, subtraction, multiplication, division etc on numerical values (constants and variables).

Operator	Meaning of Operator
+	addition or unary plus
-	subtraction or unary minus
*	multiplication
/	division
%	remainder after division (modulo division)

Example 1: Arithmetic Operators 

// Working of arithmetic operators #include <stdio.h> int main() { int a = 9,b = 4, c; c = a+b; printf("a+b = %d \n",c); c = a-b; printf("a-b = %d \n",c); c = a*b; printf("a*b = %d \n",c); c = a/b; printf("a/b = %d \n",c); c = a%b; printf("Remainder when a divided by b = %d \n",c); return 0; }

Output :

a+b = 13 a-b = 5 a*b = 36 a/b = 2 Remainder when a divided by b=1

The operators +, - and * computes addition, subtraction, and multiplication respectively as you might have expected.

In normal calculation, 9/4 = 2.25. However, the output is 2 in the program.

It is because both the variables a and b are integers. Hence, the output is also an integer. The compiler neglects the term after the decimal point and shows the answer 2 instead of 2.25.

The modulo operator % computes the remainder. When a=9 is divided by b=4, the remainder is 1. The % operator can only be used with integers.

Suppose a = 5.0, b = 2.0, c = 5 and d = 2. Then in C programming, 

// Either one of the operands is a floating-point number a/b = 2.5 a/d = 2.5 c/b = 2.5 // Both operands are integers c/d = 2

2. C Increment and Decrement Operators:-

C programming has two operators increment ++ and decrement -- to change the value of an operand (constant or variable) by 1.

Increment ++ increases the value by 1 whereas decrement -- decreases the value by 1. These two operators are unary, meaning they only operate on a single operand.

Example 2: Increment and Decrement Operators

// Working of assignment operators #include <stdio.h> int main() { int a = 5, c; c = a; // c is 5 printf("c = %d\n", c); c += a; // c is 10 printf("c = %d\n", c); c -= a; // c is 5 printf("c = %d\n", c); c *= a; // c is 25 printf("c = %d\n", c); c /= a; // c is 5 printf("c = %d\n", c); c %= a; // c = 0 printf("c = %d\n", c); return 0; }

Output

++a = 11 --b = 99 ++c = 11.500000 ++d = 99.500000

Here, the operators ++  and -- are used as prefixes. These two operators can also be used as postfixes like a++ and a-- .

3. C Assignment Operators:-

An assignment operator is used for assigning a value to a variable. The most common assignment operator is = 

Operator	Example	Same as
=	a = b	a = b
+ =	a += b	a = a+b
- =	a -= b	a = a-b
* =	a *= b	a = a*b
/ =	a /= b	a = a/b
% =	a %= b	a = a%b

Example 3: Assignment Operators

// Working of assignment operators #include <stdio.h> int main() { int a = 5, c; c = a; // c is 5 printf("c = %d\n", c); c += a; // c is 10 printf("c = %d\n", c); c -= a; // c is 5 printf("c = %d\n", c); c *= a; // c is 25 printf("c = %d\n", c); c /= a; // c is 5 printf("c = %d\n", c); c %= a; // c = 0 printf("c = %d\n", c); return 0; }

Output

c = 5 c = 10 c = 5 c = 25 c = 5 c = 0

4. C Relational Operators :-

A relational operator checks the relationship between two operands. If the relation is true, it returns 1; if the relation is false, it returns value 0.

Relational operators are used in decision making(If-else) and loops. 

Operator	Meaning of Operators	Example
==	Equal to	5 == 3 is evaluated to 0
>	Greater than	5 > 3 is evaluated to 1
<	Less than	5 < 3 is evaluated to 0
!=	Not equal to	5 != 3 is evaluated to 1
>=	Greater than or equal to	5 >= 3 is evaluated to 1
<=	Less than or equal to	5 <= 3 is evaluated to 0