Python String Length – Find Length of a String in Python

How to Find the Length of a String in Python

In this tutorial, you'll learn how to find the length of a given string using the built-in len() function in Python. Also, this tutorial provides sample programs that show you how to count the number of characters in the string using the FOR loop and WHILE loop statements.

Using the Python len() Built-in Function

To get the length of a given string using the len() function, you use the following syntax:

len(string)

Where the string argument is the string that you want to get its length.

Examples

The following program returns the length of the string:

#get the length of a string using the len() function
string = "How do I get the number of characters in the string?"
string_length = len(string)
print("The length of the string is", string_length)

Result:

The length of the string is 52

Using the FOR Loop Statement

You also can get the length of a given string without using the built-in function.

In this section, You'll learn to write programs to count the number of characters in the string using the FOR loop and WHILE loop statements.

The following program loops through the string and counts the number of characters using the FOR loop statement:

#count the number of characters using the FOR loop statement
string = "I want to learn to code in Python programming language."
number = 0
#loop through the string
for i in string:
    number += 1
print("The number of characters is ", number)

Result:

The number of characters is 55

Count Characters Using the WHILE Loop Statement

The following example counts the number of characters using the WHILE loop statement:

#count the number of characters using the WHILE loop statement
string = "How can I count the number of characters using the WHILE loop?"
count = 0
while(string[count:]):
    count += 1
print("The number of characters is ", count)

Result:

The number of characters is 62

In this tutorial, you've learned how to get the length of a given string using the len() function in Python. Also, you've learned to write a sample program to count the number of characters and return the length of the string without using the built-in function.


See also:
Python return Statement with Examples
Python List Methods and Functions with Examples
Python abs() – Absolute Value in Python
Python Factorial – Find the Factorial of a Number
Python min() – Find the Smallest Value in Python

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