Skip to main content

Bit Shifting: Left & Right

Introduction to Bit Shifting

1 min read

A bit shift is a Bitwise operation where the order of a series of bits is moved, either to the left or right, to efficiently perform a mathematical operation.

We learned the most common Bitwise operations so far. Now, we are about to learn shifting, which is a common operation we use when we divide/multiply a number by 2.

What is shifting?

A bit shift is a Bitwise operation where the order of a series of bits is moved, either to the left or right, to efficiently perform a mathematical operation.

A bit shift moves each digit in a number’s binary representation left or right. The bit-shifting operators do precisely what their name implies: they shift bits. Here is a brief introduction to the different shift operators.

Types

There are three main types of shifts:

  1. Left shift: << is the left shift operator and meets both logical and arithmetic shifts’ needs.
  2. Arithmetic/signed right shift: >> is the arithmetic (or signed) right shift operator.
  3. Logical/unsigned right shift: >>> is the logical (or unsigned) right shift operator.
Note: <<< is not an operator because it would be redundant.

These operators can be applied to integer values int, long, short, byte or char.

In some languages, applying the shift operators to any datatype smaller than int automatically resizes the operand to be an int.

Reading Progress