Python zip() Function

The Python zip() function returns a zip object which contains mapped values from similar indexes of multiple iterators. The values in the zipped object are mapped as tuples.

Syntax

zip(iterator1, iterator2, ...)

Parameters

Example:

In the example below, three iterators called month, min_temp and max_temp are mapped using zip() function.

month = ['JAN', 'FEB', 'MAR', 'APR']
min_temp = [-10, -5, -2, -1]
max_temp = [1, 5, 10, 15]

x = zip(month, min_temp, max_temp)
y = list(x)

#Accessing elements from zipped object
print(y[0])
print(y[1])
print(y[2])

The output of the above code will be:

('JAN', -10, 1)
('FEB', -5, 5)
('MAR', -2, 10)

Unzip the zipped object

To unzip a zipped object, the "*" operator is used. Using this operator, every mapped values can be stripped into tuples.

Example:

In the example below, the zipped object y is unzipped using "*" operator.

month = ['JAN', 'FEB', 'MAR', 'APR']
min_temp = [-10, -5, -2, -1]
max_temp = [1, 5, 10, 15]

x = zip(month, min_temp, max_temp)
y = list(x)

month_unzipped , min_temp_unzipped, max_temp_unzipped = zip(*y)

print(month_unzipped)
print(min_temp_unzipped)
print(max_temp_unzipped)

The output of the above code will be:

('JAN', 'FEB', 'MAR', 'APR')
(-10, -5, -2, -1)
(1, 5, 10, 15)