C strcmp() Function

strcmp() compares two strings character by character.

Return value

Result	Meaning
0	Both strings are equal
Less than 0	First string comes before the second
Greater than 0	First string comes after the second

#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>

int main(void) {
    printf("%d\n", strcmp("apple", "apple") == 0);
    printf("%d\n", strcmp("apple", "banana") < 0);
    printf("%d\n", strcmp("cat", "Cat") > 0);
    return 0;
}

Output:

The first line is 1 because the strings are equal. The second is 1 because “apple” comes before “banana”. The third is 1 because lower case letters have a bigger ASCII code than capital letters, so “cat” comes after “Cat”. The comparison is case sensitive.

Check a password

#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>

int main(void) {
    char input[] = "secret123";

    if (strcmp(input, "secret123") == 0) {
        printf("Access granted\n");
    } else {
        printf("Wrong password\n");
    }
    return 0;
}

Output:

Why not use ==

input == "secret123" compares the addresses of two arrays, not the text. It is almost always false. Always use strcmp() for strings.

Next: C strstr() Function.

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