What is the difference between '/' and '//' when used for division?

Question

Is there a benefit to using one over the other? In Python 2, they both seem to return the same results:

>>> 6/3
2
>>> 6//3
2

Answer 1

>>> print 5.0 / 2
2.5

>>> print 5.0 // 2
2.0

Answer 2

The answer of the equation is rounded to the next smaller integer or float with .0 as decimal point.

>>>print 5//2
2
>>> print 5.0//2
2.0
>>>print 5//2.0
2.0
>>>print 5.0//2.0
2.0

Answer 3

• // is floor division, it will always give you the floor value of the result.
• And the other one / is the floating-point division.

Followings are the difference between / and //; I have run these arithmetic operations in Python 3.7.2

>>> print (11 / 3)
3.6666666666666665

>>> print (11 // 3)
3

>>> print (11.3 / 3)
3.7666666666666667

>>> print (11.3 // 3)
3.0

Answer 4

// is floor division, it will always give you the integer floor of the result. The other is 'regular' division.

Answer 5

The above answers are good. I want to add another point. Up to some values both of them result in the same quotient. After that floor division operator (//) works fine but not division (/) operator.

 - > int(755349677599789174/2)
 - > 377674838799894592      #wrong answer
 - > 755349677599789174 //2
 - > 377674838799894587      #correct answer

Answer 6

The double slash, //, is floor division:

>>> 7//3
2