Access Strings
You can access the characters in a string by referring to its index number inside square brackets [].
This example prints the first character in myString:
Example
string
myString = "Hello";
cout << myString[0];
// Outputs H
Note: String indexes start with 0: [0] is the first character. [1] is the second character, etc.
This example prints the second character in myString:
Example
string
myString = "Hello";
cout << myString[1];
// Outputs e
To print the last character of a string, you can use the following code:
Example
string
myString = "Hello";
cout << myString[myString.length() - 1];
// Outputs o
Change String Characters
To change the value of a specific character in a string, refer to the index number, and use single quotes:
Example
string
myString = "Hello";
myString[0] = 'J';
cout << myString;
//
Outputs Jello instead of Hello
The at() function
The <string> library also has an at() function that can be used to access characters in a string:
Example
string myString = "Hello";
cout << myString; // Outputs Hello
cout << myString.at(0); // First character
cout << myString.at(1); //
Second character
cout << myString.at(myString.length() - 1); // Last
character
myString.at(0) = 'J';
cout << myString; // Outputs Jello
Tip: A list of other useful string functions, can be found in our String Functions Reference.
