Tutorial

How To add Elements to a List in Python

Updated on June 17, 2024
author

Pankaj

How To add Elements to a List in Python

Introduction

In this tutorial, we will learn different ways to add elements to a list in Python.

There are four methods to add elements to a List in Python.

  1. append(): append the element to the end of the list.
  2. insert(): inserts the element before the given index.
  3. extend(): extends the list by appending elements from the iterable.
  4. List Concatenation: We can use the + operator to concatenate multiple lists and create a new list.

Deploy your Python applications from GitHub using DigitalOcean App Platform. Let DigitalOcean focus on scaling your app.

Prerequisites

In order to complete this tutorial, you will need:

This tutorial was tested with Python 3.9.6.

append()

This function adds a single element to the end of the list.

fruit_list = ["Apple", "Banana"]

print(f'Current Fruits List {fruit_list}')

new_fruit = input("Please enter a fruit name:\n")

fruit_list.append(new_fruit)

print(f'Updated Fruits List {fruit_list}')

Output:

Current Fruits List ['Apple', 'Banana']
Please enter a fruit name:
Orange
Updated Fruits List ['Apple', 'Banana', 'Orange']

This example added Orange to the end of the list.

insert()

This function adds an element at the given index of the list.

num_list = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]

print(f'Current Numbers List {num_list}')

num = int(input("Please enter a number to add to list:\n"))

index = int(input(f'Please enter the index between 0 and {len(num_list) - 1} to add the number:\n'))

num_list.insert(index, num)

print(f'Updated Numbers List {num_list}')

Output:

Current Numbers List [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
Please enter a number to add to list:
20
Please enter the index between 0 and 4 to add the number:
2
Updated Numbers List [1, 2, 20, 3, 4, 5]

This example added 20 at the index of 2. 20 has been inserted into the list at this index.

extend()

This function adds iterable elements to the list.

extend_list = []

extend_list.extend([1, 2])  # extending list elements

print(extend_list)

extend_list.extend((3, 4))  # extending tuple elements

print(extend_list)

extend_list.extend("ABC")  # extending string elements

print(extend_list)

Output:

[1, 2]
[1, 2, 3, 4]
[1, 2, 3, 4, 'A', 'B', 'C']

This example added a list of [1, 2]. Then it added a tuple of (3, 4). And then it added a string of ABC.

List Concatenation

If you have to concatenate multiple lists, you can use the + operator. This will create a new list, and the original lists will remain unchanged.

evens = [2, 4, 6]
odds = [1, 3, 5]

nums = odds + evens

print(nums)  # [1, 3, 5, 2, 4, 6]

This example added the list of evens to the end of the list of odds. The new list will contain elements from the list from left to right. It’s similar to the string concatenation in Python.

Conclusion

Python provides multiple ways to add elements to a list. We can append an element at the end of the list, and insert an element at the given index. We can also add a list to another list. If you want to concatenate multiple lists, then use the overloaded + operator

References:

Thanks for learning with the DigitalOcean Community. Check out our offerings for compute, storage, networking, and managed databases.

Learn more about our products


About the authors
Default avatar
Pankaj

author

Still looking for an answer?

Ask a questionSearch for more help

Was this helpful?
 
JournalDev
DigitalOcean Employee
DigitalOcean Employee badge
December 6, 2020

list1 = [“M”, “na”, “i”, “Ke”] list2 = [“y”, “me”, “s”, “lly”] list3 = [i + j for i,j in zip(list1, list2)] How is the above different to this; list3 = list() for i,j in zip(list1, list2): list3 = i + j how are these 2 codes different from one another?

- Asad Jaffer

    JournalDev
    DigitalOcean Employee
    DigitalOcean Employee badge
    November 23, 2020

    how to use add method like i mean list.add(x)… explain

    - Abdul

      JournalDev
      DigitalOcean Employee
      DigitalOcean Employee badge
      August 18, 2020

      new_list=elements[::2] #explain this

      - Varada

        JournalDev
        DigitalOcean Employee
        DigitalOcean Employee badge
        April 23, 2020

        is there anything like list.add(num)

        - harshita

          Try DigitalOcean for free

          Click below to sign up and get $200 of credit to try our products over 60 days!

          Sign up

          Join the Tech Talk
          Success! Thank you! Please check your email for further details.

          Please complete your information!

          Featured on Community

          Get our biweekly newsletter

          Sign up for Infrastructure as a Newsletter.

          Hollie's Hub for Good

          Working on improving health and education, reducing inequality, and spurring economic growth? We'd like to help.

          Become a contributor

          Get paid to write technical tutorials and select a tech-focused charity to receive a matching donation.

          Welcome to the developer cloud

          DigitalOcean makes it simple to launch in the cloud and scale up as you grow — whether you're running one virtual machine or ten thousand.

          Learn more
          DigitalOcean Cloud Control Panel