Programming Fundamentals/Relational Operators

Overview[edit | edit source]

A relational operator is a programming language construct or operator that tests or defines some kind of relation between two entities. These include numerical equality (e.g., 5 = 5) and inequalities (e.g., 4 ≥ 3).^[1]

Discussion[edit | edit source]

Relational operators give a Boolean value (data type that has one of two possible values to represent the two truths of logic) by evaluating the relationship between two operands.

Operator symbols and/or names can vary with different programming languages. Most programming languages use relational operators similar to the following:

Operator	Meaning
`<`	less than
`>`	greater than
`<=`	less than or equal to
`>=`	greater than or equal to
`==`	equality (equal to)
`!=` or `<>`	inequality (not equal to)

Examples:

9 < 25
9 < 3
9 > 14
9 <= 17
9 >= 25
9 == 13
9 != 13
9 !< 25
9 <> 25

Note: Be careful. In math you are familiar with using the symbol = to mean equal and ≠ to mean not equal, but in many programming languages the ≠ is not used and the = symbol means assignment.