C find static array size

Question

static char* theFruit[] = {
    "lemon",
    "orange",
    "apple",
    "banana"
};

I know the size is 4 by looking at this array. How do I programmatically find the size of this array in C? I do not want the size in bytes.

Fred Foo · Accepted Answer · 2012-04-23 15:31:51Z

50

sizeof(theFruit) / sizeof(theFruit[0])

Note that sizeof(theFruit[0]) == sizeof(char *), a constant.

edited Apr 23, 2012 at 15:31

answered Apr 23, 2012 at 15:20

Fred Foo

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4 Comments

Israel Unterman Over a year ago

Yes, it's exactly the way to it. That's why he's getting +1s.... :-). But only with arrays, as you have in your question. Not with pointers.

Fred Foo Over a year ago

@eat_a_lemon: depends on what you call every case :) It works for static and automatic arrays, not malloc'd ones. Note that the size of the array is always a multiple of the size of the first element, so the division is guaranteed to work, and that sizeof only looks at types, so it even works for arrays with zero elements.

eat_a_lemon Over a year ago

I think what I am confused about is that the entries are variable size because they are strings.

Fred Foo Over a year ago

@eat_a_lemon: the entries aren't strings; they're char*s pointing to strings.

Dav · Accepted Answer · 2023-06-05 15:34:21Z

1

It's always a good thing to have this macro around.

#define SIZEOF(arr) (sizeof(arr) / sizeof(*arr))

edited Jun 5, 2023 at 15:34

answered Jun 5, 2023 at 15:33

Dav

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Comments

user13672091 · Accepted Answer · 2021-09-23 09:57:55Z

0

Use const char* instead as they will be stored in read-only place. And to get size of array unsigned size = sizeof(theFruit)/sizeof(*theFruit); Both *theFruit and theFruit[0] are same.

answered Sep 23, 2021 at 9:57

user13672091

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