Overview image

The Python interpreter comes with some built-in functions that provide useful functionality. Some of the commonly used built-in functions include print(), input(), len(), etc.

These functions are a part of the Python language and do not need to be imported or installed.

As of Python 3.11.3 , the total built-in functions sums up to 68. These functions are as shown in the table below:

abs aiter all any ascii
bool breakpoint bytearray bytes callable
classmethod compile complex delattr dict
divmod enumerate eval exec filter
format frozenset getattr globals hasattr
help hex id input int
issubclass iter len list locals
max min next object oct
ord pow print property repr
round set setattr slice sorted
str sum super tuple type
zip __import__ bin chr dir
float hash isinstance map open
reversed staticmethod vars    

you can click on a function above to see its syntax, usage and other features.

Where are the functions defined?

The built-in functions in Python are implemented in Python and  partly in C. C is a lower-level language than Python, this allows Python to benefit from the speed and efficiency of C for performance-critical operations.

The builtins module in the standard library provides an interface to access the built-in functions. When you use a built-in function in your Python code, you are actually calling the corresponding function object from the builtins module.

ExampleEdit & Run
import builtins

builtins.print('Hello, World')
builtins.print(builtins.sorted([9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1]))
 Visualize 
copy
Output:
Hello, World
[1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9]
[Finished in 0.010538362432271242s]

You can use the builtin help() function to see more an each function such as usage and arguments.

Syntax: 
help(function_name)
copy
ExampleEdit & Run
help('print')
 Visualize 
copy
Output:
Help on built-in function print in module builtins:

print(*args, sep=' ', end='\n', file=None, flush=False)
    Prints the values to a stream, or to sys.stdout by default.
    
    sep
      string inserted between values, default a space.
    end
      string appended after the last value, default a newline.
    file
      a file-like object (stream); defaults to the current sys.stdout.
    flush
      whether to forcibly flush the stream.

[Finished in 0.05024394812062383s]