Ranges represent a sequence of zero, one or many, ascending or descending integers with a common difference called step.

The most common form of creating and matching on ranges is via the first..last and first..last//step notations, auto-imported from Kernel:

iex> 1 in 1..10
true
iex> 5 in 1..10
true
iex> 10 in 1..10
true

Ranges are always inclusive in Elixir. When a step is defined, integers will only belong to the range if they match the step:

iex> 5 in 1..10//2
true
iex> 4 in 1..10//2
false

When defining a range without a step, the step will be defined based on the first and last position of the range, If first >= last, it will be an increasing range with a step of 1. Otherwise, it is a decreasing range. Note however implicit decreasing ranges are deprecated. Therefore, if you need a decreasing range from 3 to 1, prefer to write 3..1//-1 instead.

../0 can also be used as a shortcut to create the range 0..-1//1, also known as the full-slice range:

iex> ..
0..-1//1

Use cases

Ranges typically have two uses in Elixir: as a collection or to represent a slice of another data structure.

Ranges as collections

Ranges in Elixir are enumerables and therefore can be used with the Enum module:

iex> Enum.to_list(1..3)
[1, 2, 3]
iex> Enum.to_list(3..1//-1)
[3, 2, 1]
iex> Enum.to_list(1..5//2)
[1, 3, 5]

Ranges may also have a single element:

iex> Enum.to_list(1..1)
[1]
iex> Enum.to_list(1..1//2)
[1]

Or even no elements at all:

iex> Enum.to_list(10..0//1)
[]
iex> Enum.to_list(0..10//-1)
[]

The full-slice range, returned by ../0, is an empty collection:

iex> Enum.to_list(..)
[]

Ranges as slices

Ranges are also frequently used to slice collections. You can slice strings or any enumerable:

iex> String.slice("elixir", 1..4)
"lixi"
iex> Enum.slice([0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5], 1..4)
[1, 2, 3, 4]

In those cases, the first and last values of the range are mapped to positions in the collections.

If a negative number is given, it maps to a position from the back:

iex> String.slice("elixir", 1..-2//1)
"lixi"
iex> Enum.slice([0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5], 1..-2//1)
[1, 2, 3, 4]

The range 0..-1//1, returned by ../0, returns the collection as is, which is why it is called the full-slice range:

iex> String.slice("elixir", ..)
"elixir"
iex> Enum.slice([0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5], ..)
[0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

Definition

An increasing range first..last//step is a range from first to last increasing by step where step must be a positive integer and all values v must be first <= v and v <= last. Therefore, a range 10..0//1 is an empty range because there is no value v that is 10 <= v and v <= 0.

Similarly, a decreasing range first..last//step is a range from first to last decreasing by step where step must be a negative integer and values v must be first >= v and v >= last. Therefore, a range 0..10//-1 is an empty range because there is no value v that is 0 >= v and v >= 10.

Representation

Internally, ranges are represented as structs:

iex> range = 1..9//2
1..9//2
iex> first..last//step = range
iex> first
1
iex> last
9
iex> step
2
iex> range.step
2

You can access the range fields (first, last, and step) directly but you should not modify nor create ranges by hand. Instead use the proper operators or new/2 and new/3.

Ranges implement the Enumerable protocol with memory efficient versions of all Enumerable callbacks:

iex> range = 1..10
1..10
iex> Enum.reduce(range, 0, fn i, acc -> i * i + acc end)
385
iex> Enum.count(range)
10
iex> Enum.member?(range, 11)
false
iex> Enum.member?(range, 8)
true

Such function calls are efficient memory-wise no matter the size of the range. The implementation of the Enumerable protocol uses logic based solely on the endpoints and does not materialize the whole list of integers.