A list is a collection of items that are ordered and changeable. It is one of the most commonly used data structures in Python. Think of a list as a container that can hold multiple values. To create a list, you use square brackets `[]` and separate the items with commas. Here's an example:
fruits = ["apple", "banana", "orange"]
In this example, we created a list called `fruits` that contains three [strings](/tutorials/str): `"apple"`, `"banana"`, and `"orange"`. The order of the items in the list is preserved. You can access individual items in a list by their index. The index starts from `0` for the first item, `1` for the second item, and so on. For example:
print(fruits[0]) # Output: "apple" print(fruits[1]) # Output: "banana"
apple banana
In this code, we use square brackets after the list name to access specific items. `fruits[0]` gives us the first item in the list, which is `"apple"`, and `fruits[1]` gives us the second item, which is `"banana"`. You can also change the value of an item in a list by assigning a new value to its index. For example:
fruits[2] = "grape" print(fruits) # Output: ["apple", "banana", "grape"]
['apple', 'banana', 'grape']
In the code above, we assign the value `"grape"` to the third item in the list (`fruits[2]`). After this change, the list will be `["apple", "banana", "grape"]`. Lists in Python are also dynamic, which means you can add or remove items from them. Here are a few examples:
fruits.append("kiwi") # Add an item to the end of the list
print(fruits) # Output: ["apple", "banana", "grape", "kiwi"]
fruits.remove("banana") # Remove a specific item from the list
print(fruits) # Output: ["apple", "grape", "kiwi"]['apple', 'banana', 'grape', 'kiwi'] ['apple', 'grape', 'kiwi']
In the first example, we use the `append()` method to add the item `"kiwi"` to the end of the list. In the second example, we use the `remove()` method to remove the item `"banana"` from the list. Lists allow us to store multiple values and access them using their index. If you want to store key-value pairs (e.g. name = John, age = 15), use a [dictionary](/tutorials/dict) instead.