What is the value of None in memory?

Question

None in Python is a reserved word, just a question crossed my mind about the exact value of None in memory. What I'm holding in my mind is this, None's representation in memory is either 0 or a pointer pointing to a heap. But neither the pointer pointing to an empty area in the memory will make sense neither the zero value. Because when I tested the following:

>>> None.__sizeof__()
16

It turns out that None consumes 16 bytes and that's actually too much for simply an empty value.

So what does None actually represents in memory?

Answer 1

None references some Python object of the NoneType, actually the only instance of its kind. Since it’s a Python object—like literally every other thing—it’s not just the raw content what is stored about also the additional object information like its type.

Every object has this overhead; that’s why integers start with a size of 28 for example. You cannot change this, it’s an implementation detail of Python and its type system.