Summary: in this tutorial, you’ll learn about Python comparison operators and how to use them to compare two values.
Introduction to Python comparison operators
In programming, you often want to compare a value with another value. To do that, you use comparison operators.
Python has six comparison operators, which are as follows:
- Less than [
=]
- Equal to [
==
] - Not equal to [
!=
]
These comparison operators compare two values and return a boolean value, either True
or False
.
And you can use these comparison operators to compare both numbers and strings.
Less than operator [ 10 < 20 True >>> 30 < 20 FalseCode language: Python [python]
It’s quite obvious when you use the less-than operator with the numbers.
The
following example uses the less than operator [>> 'apple' < 'orange'
True
>>> 'banana' < 'apple'
False
The expression 'apple' < 'orange'
returns True
because the letter a
in apple
is before the letter o
in orange
.
Similarly, the 'banana' < 'apple'
returns False
because the letter 'b'
is after the letter 'a'
.
The following example shows how to use the less-than operator with variables:
Code language: Python [python]
>>> x = 10 >>> y = 20 >>> x < y True >>> y < x False
Less than or equal to operator [> 20 >> 10 >> 30 >> x = 10 >>> y = 20 >>> x >> y ]
The greater than operator [>
] compares two values and returns True
if the left value is greater than the right value. Otherwise, it returns False
:
Code language: Python [python]
left_value > right_value
This example uses the greater than operator [>
] to compare two numbers:
Code language: Python [python]
>>> 20 > 10 True >>> 20 > 20 False >>> 10 > 20 False
And the following example uses the greater than operator [>
] to compare two strings:
Code language: Python [python]
>>> 'apple' > 'orange' False >>> 'orange' > 'apple' True
Greater Than or Equal To operator [>=
]
The greater than or equal to operator [>=
] compares two values
and returns True
if the left value is greater than or equal to the right value. Otherwise, it returns False
:
left_value >= right_value
Code language: Python [python]
The following example uses the greater than or equal to operator to compare two numbers:
Code language: Python [python]
>>> 20 >= 10 True >>> 20 >= 20 True >>> 10 >= 20 False
And the following example uses the greater than or equal to operator to compare two strings:
Code language: Python [python]
>>> 'apple' >= 'apple' True >>> 'apple' >= 'orange' False >>> 'orange' >= 'apple' True
Equal To operator [==]
The equal to operator [==
] compares two values and returns True
if the left value is equal to the right value. Otherwise,
it returns False
:
Code language: Python [python]
left_value == right_value
The following example uses the equal to operator [==
] to compare two numbers:
Code language: Python [python]
>>> 20 == 10 False >>> 20 == 20 True
And the following example uses the equal to operator [==
] to compare two strings:
>>> 'apple' == 'apple' True >>> 'apple' == 'orange' False
Code language: Python [python]
Not Equal To operator [!=]
The not equal to operator [!=
] compares two values and returns True
if the left value isn’t equal to the right value. Otherwise, it returns False
.
Code language: Python [python]
left_value != right_value
For example, the following uses the not equal to operator to compare two numbers:
Code language: Python [python]
>>> 20 != 20 False >>> 20 != 10 True
And the following example uses the not equal to operator to compare two strings:
Code language: Python [python]
>>> 'apple' != 'apple' False >>> 'apple' != 'orange' True
Summary
- A comparison operator compares two values and returns a boolean value, either
True
orFalse
. - Python has six comparison operators: less than [
=
], equal to [==
], and not equal to [!=
].
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