Complexity of len() with regard to sets and lists

Question

The complexity of len() with regards to sets and lists is equally O(1). How come it takes more time to process sets?

~$ python -m timeit \"a=[1,2,3,         


        

Answer 1

Remove the len(a) statement. The result is pretty much the same. A set needs to be hashed to retain only distinct items so it's slower.