C Bitwise Operators

Summary: in this tutorial, you’ll learn about the C bitwise operators and how to use them effectively in the program.

Introduction to C bitwise operators

C provides six bitwise operators for manipulating bits. The bitwise operator can only be applied to operands such as char, short, int, and long.

The following table shows all the C bitwise operators:

The bitwise operators are preferred in some contexts because bitwise operations are faster than (+) and (-) operations and significantly faster than (*) and (/) operations.

C bitwise operator example

Here’s a program that illustrates how to use the C bitwise operators:

#include <stdio.h>

int main()
{
    int d1 = 4, /* binary 100 */
        d2 = 6, /* binary 110 */
        d3;

    printf("d1=%d, d2 = %d\n", d1, d2);

    d3 = d1 & d2;
    printf("Bitwise AND  d1 & d2 = %d\n", d3);

    d3 = d1 | d2;
    printf("Bitwise OR d1 | d2 = %d\n", d3);

    d3 = d1 ^ d2;
    printf("Bitwise XOR d1 ^ d2 = %d\n", d3);

    d3 = ~d1;
    printf("Ones complement of d1 = %d\n", d3);

    d3 = d1 << 2;
    printf("Left shift by 2 bits d1 << 2 = %d\n", d3);

    d3 = d1 >> 2;
    printf("Right shift by 2 bits d1 >> 2 = %d\n", d3);

    return 0;
}
   
Code language: C++ (cpp)

Output:

d1=4, d2 = 6
Bitwise AND  d1 & d2 = 4
Bitwise OR d1 | d2 = 6
Bitwise XOR d1 ^ d2 = 2
Ones complement of d1 = -5
Left shift by 2 bits d1 << 2 = 16
Right shift by 2 bits d1 >> 2 = 1
Code language: C++ (cpp)