Python - Get the first digit of a number

In this tutorial, we are going to learn about how to get the first digit of a number in Python with the help of examples.

In Python, strings are the sequence of characters, where the index of the first character is 0, the second character is 1, third character is 3 and the last character index -1.

Consider, we have a following number:

pin = 67683

To get the first digit of a number:

1. Convert the number to a string using the str() Function.

2. Use the square brackets syntax [] to access the first character of a string.

3. Convert the result back to a number to get the first digit of the number.

Here is an example:

pin = 67683
first_digit_str = str(pin)[0]

result = int(first_digit_str) # str to int
print(result)

Output:

6

In the example above, first we converted the number to a string, so we can use the square brackets syntax on it.

You can access the characters of a string, by using the square brackets syntax and specifying an index.

0 is the index of a first character in the string. At last we have used the int() function to convert the string to a number.

You can also shorten the above code in a single line like this:

pin = 67683
first_digit = int(str(pin)[0])

print(first_digit)