Operators Overview

Operators are special symbols that perform operations on values (operands). Python provides several categories of operators.

Operators and Operands

result = 10 + 5
#        ^  ^ ^
#        |  | operand
#        |  operator
#        operand

• Operator: Symbol that performs an operation (+, -, *, etc.)
• Operand: Value the operator acts upon

Operator Categories

Category	Operators	Example
Arithmetic	+, -, *, /, //, %, **	3 + 2
Comparison	==, !=, <, >, <=, >=	3 > 2
Logical	and, or, not	True and False
Assignment	=, +=, -=, *=, etc.	x += 1
Bitwise	&, \|, ^, ~, <<, >>	5 & 3
Identity	is, is not	x is None
Membership	in, not in	'a' in 'cat'

Quick Examples

# Arithmetic
print(10 + 3)   # 13
print(10 / 3)   # 3.333...
print(10 // 3)  # 3 (floor division)
print(10 % 3)   # 1 (remainder)
print(2 ** 3)   # 8 (power)

# Comparison
print(5 > 3)    # True
print(5 == 5)   # True

# Logical
print(True and False)  # False
print(True or False)   # True
print(not True)        # False

# Identity
x = [1, 2]
y = [1, 2]
print(x == y)   # True (same value)
print(x is y)   # False (different objects)

# Membership
print('a' in 'cat')     # True
print(3 in [1, 2, 3])   # True

Operator Behavior Depends on Types

The same operator can behave differently based on operand types:

# + with numbers: addition
print(3 + 2)        # 5

# + with strings: concatenation
print("Hello" + " World")  # "Hello World"

# + with lists: concatenation
print([1, 2] + [3, 4])     # [1, 2, 3, 4]

# * with number and string: repetition
print("ab" * 3)     # "ababab"

# * with number and list: repetition
print([1, 2] * 2)   # [1, 2, 1, 2]

Summary

• Operators perform operations on operands
• Python has 7 main operator categories
• Operator behavior can vary by operand type
• See specific pages for details on each category