Bitwise Operators

The bitwise operators perform Boolean algebra. Each of these operators performs their operations on each bit of the operands. For instance, if we have two 4-bit binary values, the operation will be carried out between bit 0 of each value, then between bit 1 of each value and so on. In other words, these operators do a bunch of single-bit operations in parallel.

Operator Operation Example Result (for each bit position)
& Bitwise AND x & y 1, if 1 in both x and y
0, if 0 in x or y or both
| Bitwise OR x | y 1, if 1 in x or y or both
0, if 0 in both x and y
^ Bitwise XOR x ^ y 1, if 1 in x or y but not both
0, if 0 or 1 in both x and y
~ Bitwise NOT
(One's Complement)
~x 1, if 0 in x
0, if 1 in x
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