How to create an empty array in Swift?

Question

I'm really confused with the ways we create an array in Swift. Could you please tell me how many ways to create an empty array with some detail?

Answer 1

var myArr1 = [AnyObject]()

can store any object

var myArr2 = [String]()

can store only string

Answer 2

If you want to declare an empty array of string type you can do that in 5 different way:-

var myArray: Array<String> = Array()
var myArray = [String]()
var myArray: [String] = []
var myArray = Array<String>()
var myArray:Array<String> = []

Array of any type :-

    var myArray: Array<AnyObject> = Array()
    var myArray = [AnyObject]()
    var myArray: [AnyObject] = []
    var myArray = Array<AnyObject>()
    var myArray:Array<AnyObject> = []

Array of Integer type :-

    var myArray: Array<Int> = Array()
    var myArray = [Int]()
    var myArray: [Int] = []
    var myArray = Array<Int>()
    var myArray:Array<Int> = []

Answer 3

Swift 3

There are three (3) ways to create a empty array in Swift and shorthand syntax way is always preferred.

Method 1: Shorthand Syntax

var arr = [Int]()

Method 2: Array Initializer

var arr = Array<Int>()

Method 3: Array with an Array Literal

var arr:[Int] = []

Method 4: Credit goes to @BallpointBen

var arr:Array<Int> = []

Answer 4

Swift 5

// Create an empty array
var emptyArray = [String]()

// Add values to array by appending (Adds values as the last element)
emptyArray.append("Apple")
emptyArray.append("Oppo")

// Add values to array by inserting (Adds to a specified position of the list)
emptyArray.insert("Samsung", at: 0)

// Remove elements from an array by index number
emptyArray.remove(at: 2)

// Remove elements by specifying the element
if let removeElement = emptyArray.firstIndex(of: "Samsung") {
    emptyArray.remove(at: removeElement)
}

A similar answer is given but that doesn't work for the latest version of Swift (Swift 5), so here is the updated answer. Hope it helps! :)

Answer 5

There are 2 major ways to create/intialize an array in swift.

var myArray = [Double]()

This would create an array of Doubles.

var myDoubles = [Double](count: 5, repeatedValue: 2.0)

This would create an array of 5 doubles, all initialized with the value of 2.0.

Answer 6

Array in swift is written as **Array < Element > **, where Element is the type of values the array is allowed to store.

Array can be initialized as :

let emptyArray = [String]()

It shows that its an array of type string

The type of the emptyArray variable is inferred to be [String] from the type of the initializer.

For Creating the array of type string with elements

var groceryList: [String] = ["Eggs", "Milk"]

groceryList has been initialized with two items

The groceryList variable is declared as “an array of string values”, written as [String]. This particular array has specified a value type of String, it is allowed to store String values only.

There are various properities of array like :

- To check if array has elements (If array is empty or not)

isEmpty property( Boolean ) for checking whether the count property is equal to 0:

if groceryList.isEmpty {
    print("The groceryList list is empty.")
} else {
    print("The groceryList is not empty.")
}

- Appending(adding) elements in array

You can add a new item to the end of an array by calling the array’s append(_:) method:

groceryList.append("Flour")

groceryList now contains 3 items.

Alternatively, append an array of one or more compatible items with the addition assignment operator (+=):

groceryList += ["Baking Powder"]

groceryList now contains 4 items

groceryList += ["Chocolate Spread", "Cheese", "Peanut Butter"]

groceryList now contains 7 items