[]<\/code>.<\/p>\n\n\n\nLet\u2019s go through a few examples to see it in action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
list_example = [10, 20, 30, 'abc', 40]\nlen(list_example) # 5\n\nlist_example = []\nlist_example.append('a')\nlist_example.append('b')\nlist_example.append('c')\nlen(list_example) # 3\n\nlist_example = list()\nlist_example.append('a')\nlist_example.append('b')\nlen(list_example) # 2\n\nlist_example = []\nlen(list_example) # 0<\/pre>\n\n\n\nFind the Python list size using the naive approach<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
To find the number of elements list contains, you can also count list items manually using the for loop.<\/strong> This simple approach is not as effective as using Python\u2019s len()<\/code> method since it requires O(n)<\/strong> time. Still, it can be used when performance is not an important factor.<\/p>\n\n\n\nPseudocode for counting list elements goes like this:<\/p>\n\n\n\n
- Initialize the
counter<\/code> variable with zero<\/li>- Iterate over elements in a list using the for loop
- For each iteration, increase the
counter<\/code> value by 1<\/li><\/ul><\/li>- After traversing the list elements is over, the
counter<\/code> value represents the total number of elements in a Python list<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\nLet\u2019s see it in code now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
list_example = [10, 20, 30, \"abc\", 40]\n\ncounter = 0\nfor val in list_example:\n counter += 1\n\nprint(counter) # 5<\/pre>\n\n\n\n