What does << represent in python?

Question

Python says

1 << 16 = 65536

What operation does << performs in Python?

Answer 1

This is left shift operator

1<<16 implies 1 to be shifted left by 16 bits.

Answer 2

Another way to think about it is 1 times 2^16.

So whenever you see x << y interpret it as:

x * 2^y

Answer 3

It is the left shift operator for Python. A left shift operation, as the name says, move bits to the left.

Suppose you have 2 whose binary representation is 0010. So 2<<2 means to shift the bits twice to the left:

0010 -> 0100 -> 1000

1000 is the binary representation for 8. Mathematically, left shifting is the same as multiplying a number by a power of 2 : a<<b == a*2^b , but as the operation is done only by shifting, it is much faster than doing multiplications.

Answer 4

<< it's the left-shift operator in Python. Take a look at the documentation for further details.