fgetc, getc

 

C

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Technical Specifications

Symbol index

 

File input/output

Types and objects
FILE fpos_t      stdinstdoutstderr
Functions
File access fopenfopen_s (C11) freopenfreopen_s (C11) fwide (C95) setbuf setvbuf fclose fflush Direct input/output fread fwrite Unformatted input/output fgetc fgets fputc fputs getchar getsgets_s (until C11)(C11) putchar puts ungetc fgetwcgetwc (C95)(C95) fgetws (C95) fputwcputwc (C95)(C95) fputws (C95) getwchar (C95) putwchar (C95) ungetwc (C95) Formatted input scanffscanfsscanfscanf_sfscanf_ssscanf_s (C11)(C11)(C11) wscanffwscanfswscanfwscanf_sfwscanf_sswscanf_s (C95)(C95)(C95)(C11)(C11)(C11)     vscanfvfscanfvsscanfvscanf_svfscanf_svsscanf_s (C99)(C99)(C99)(C11)(C11)(C11) vwscanfvfwscanfvswscanfvwscanf_svfwscanf_svswscanf_s (C99)(C99)(C99)(C11)(C11)(C11)	Formatted output printffprintfsprintfsnprintfprintf_sfprintf_ssprintf_ssnprintf_s (C99)(C11)(C11)(C11)(C11) wprintffwprintfswprintfwprintf_sfwprintf_sswprintf_ssnwprintf_s (C95)(C95)(C95)(C11)(C11)(C11)(C11)     vprintfvfprintfvsprintfvsnprintfvprintf_svfprintf_svsprintf_svsnprintf_s (C99)(C11)(C11)(C11)(C11) vwprintfvfwprintfvswprintfvwprintf_svfwprintf_svswprintf_svsnwprintf_s (C95)(C95)(C95)(C11)(C11)(C11)(C11) File positioning ftell fgetpos fseek fsetpos rewind Error handling clearerr feof ferror perror Operations on files remove rename tmpfiletmpfile_s (C11) tmpnamtmpnam_s (C11)

 

Defined in header <stdio.h>
int fgetc( FILE* stream );	(1)
int getc( FILE* stream );	(2)

1) Reads the next character from the given input stream.

2) Same as fgetc, except that if getc is implemented as a macro, it may evaluate stream more than once, so the corresponding argument should never be an expression with side effects.

Parameters

stream

-

to read the character from

Return value

On success, returns the obtained character as an unsigned char converted to an int. On failure, returns EOF.

If the failure has been caused by end-of-file condition, additionally sets the eof indicator (see feof()) on stream. If the failure has been caused by some other error, sets the error indicator (see ferror()) on stream.

Example

Run this code

#include <stdio.h>
#include <stdlib.h>
 
int main(void)
{
    const char* fname = "/tmp/unique_name.txt"; // or tmpnam(NULL);
    int is_ok = EXIT_FAILURE;
 
    FILE* fp = fopen(fname, "w+");
    if (!fp) {
        perror("File opening failed");
        return is_ok;
    }
    fputs("Hello, world!\n", fp);
    rewind(fp);
 
    int c; // note: int, not char, required to handle EOF
    while ((c = fgetc(fp)) != EOF) // standard C I/O file reading loop
        putchar(c);
 
    if (ferror(fp))
        puts("I/O error when reading");
    else if (feof(fp)) {
        puts("End of file is reached successfully");
        is_ok = EXIT_SUCCESS;
    }
 
    fclose(fp);
    remove(fname);
    return is_ok;
}

Possible output:

Hello, world!
End of file is reached successfully

References

• C23 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:2024):

• 7.21.7.1 The fgetc function (p: TBD)

• 7.21.7.5 The getc function (p: TBD)

• C17 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:2018):

• 7.21.7.1 The fgetc function (p: 240-241)

• 7.21.7.5 The getc function (p: 242)

• C11 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:2011):

• 7.21.7.1 The fgetc function (p: 330)

• 7.21.7.5 The getc function (p: 332)

• C99 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:1999):

• 7.19.7.1 The fgetc function (p: 296)

• 7.19.7.5 The getc function (p: 297-298)

• C89/C90 standard (ISO/IEC 9899:1990):

• 4.9.7.1 The fgetc function

• 4.9.7.5 The getc function

See also

getchar	reads a character from stdin (function)
getsgets_s (removed in C11)(C11)	reads a character string from stdin (function)
fputcputc	writes a character to a file stream (function)
ungetc	puts a character back into a file stream (function)
C++ documentation for fgetc, getc