Access Individual Characters

Given a String, you can access the individual characters which comprise it by using .charAt.

The first character can be accessed by putting 0 in the parentheses. The second by using 1, and so on.

String spy = "loid";

char l = spi.charAt(0);
System.out.println(l);

char o = spi.charAt(1);
System.out.println(o);

char i = spi.charAt(2);
System.out.println(i);

char d = spi.charAt(3);
System.out.println(d);

We call this number the "index" of the character.¹

The index of the character to access can come from a variable.

String assassin = "yor";
int indexOfR = 2;

char r = assassin.charAt(indexOfR);
System.out.println(r);

If you give a number equal to or greater than the length of the String or a number less than zero, you will get an error.

String student = "anya";
// Crash!
student.charAt(999);

String dog = "bond";
// Crash!
dog.charAt(-1);