Constants in C

A constant is a value or variable that can’t be changed in the program, for example: 10, 20, ‘a’, 3.4, “c programming” etc.

There are different types of constants in C programming.

List of Constants in C

Constant	Example
Decimal Constant	10, 20, 450 etc.
Real or Floating-point Constant	10.3, 20.2, 450.6 etc.
Octal Constant	021, 033, 046 etc.
Hexadecimal Constant	0x2a, 0x7b, 0xaa etc.
Character Constant	‘a’, ‘b’, ‘x’ etc.
String Constant	“c”, “c program”, “c in tutoraspire” etc.

There are two ways to define constant in C programming.

The const keyword is used to define constant in C programming.

Now, the value of PI variable can’t be changed.

 #include   int main(){   const float PI=3.14;   printf(“The value of PI is: %f”,PI);   return 0; }    

Output:

The value of PI is: 3.140000

If you try to change the the value of PI, it will render compile time error.

 #include   int main(){   const float PI=3.14;    PI=4.5;   printf(“The value of PI is: %f”,PI);   return 0; }    

Output:

Compile Time Error: Cannot modify a const object

The #define preprocessor is also used to define constant. We will learn about #define preprocessor directive later.