Share via

char (C# Reference) 

  • Article

The char keyword is used to declare a Unicode character in the range indicated in the following table. Unicode characters are 16-bit characters used to represent most of the known written languages throughout the world.

Type Range Size .NET Framework type

char

U+0000 to U+ffff

Unicode 16-bit character

System.Char

Literals

Constants of the char type can be written as character literals, hexadecimal escape sequence, or Unicode representation. You can also cast the integral character codes. All of the following statements declare a char variable and initialize it with the character X:

char char1 = 'Z';        // Character literal
char char2 = '\x0058';   // Hexadecimal
char char3 = (char)88;   // Cast from integral type
char char4 = '\u0058';   // Unicode

Conversions

A char can be implicitly converted to ushort, int, uint, long, ulong, float, double, or decimal. However, there are no implicit conversions from other types to the char type.

C# Language Specification

For more information, see the following sections in the C# Language Specification:

  • 1.3 Types and Variables

  • 2.4.4.4 Character Literals

  • 4.1.5 Integral Types

See Also

Reference

C# Keywords
Integral Types Table (C# Reference)
Built-In Types Table (C# Reference)
Implicit Numeric Conversions Table (C# Reference)
Explicit Numeric Conversions Table (C# Reference)
Char Structure

Concepts

C# Programming Guide

Other Resources

C# Reference