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What is the difference between using int and uint? All the examples I have seen so far are using int for integers. Any advantage of using uint? Thanks.
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uint means “unsigned integer” while int means “signed integer”. Unsigned integers only contain positive numbers (or zero). In addition there two alias types: byte which is the same as uint8 and rune which is the same as int32 .
Unsigned integers are used when we know that the value that we are storing will always be non-negative (zero or positive). Note: it is almost always the case that you could use a regular integer variable in place of an unsigned integer.
A signed integer is a 32-bit datum that encodes an integer in the range [-2147483648 to 2147483647]. An unsigned integer is a 32-bit datum that encodes a nonnegative integer in the range [0 to 4294967295]. The signed integer is represented in twos complement notation.
uint and ulong are the unsigned versions of int and long . That means they can't be negative. Instead they have a larger maximum value. To write a literal unsigned int in your source code you can use the suffix u or U for example 123U .
uint means unsigned int, you can use it for a 0 .. +4G range
where the normal (signed) int has a -2G .. +2G range.
When to use it? Almost never. It is not a CLS compliant type so you should never use it in the public interface of an assembly. Not all .NET languages can handle it.
Their main use is in P/Invoke to unmanaged code and some rare bitmask situations. In .NET, we do most bitmasking with normal signed ints.
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