std::rand

 

C++

Language

Standard Library Headers

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Named requirements

Language support library

Concepts library (C++20)

Diagnostics library

Utilities library

Strings library

Containers library

Iterators library

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Numerics library

Input/output library

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Atomic operations library (C++11)

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Filesystem library (C++17)

Technical Specifications

 

Numerics library

Common mathematical functions

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Floating-point environment (C++11)

Complex numbers

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Pseudo-random number generation

Compile-time rational arithmetic (C++11)

Numeric algorithms

gcd (C++17)

lcm (C++17)

Interpolations

midpoint (C++20)

lerp (C++20)

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iota (C++11)

accumulate

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reduce (C++17)

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inclusive_scan (C++17)

exclusive_scan (C++17)

transform_inclusive_scan (C++17)

transform_exclusive_scan (C++17)

Bit operations

bit_cast (C++20)

ispow2 (C++20)

ceil2 (C++20)

floor2 (C++20)

log2p1 (C++20)

 

Pseudo-random number generation

Uniform random bit generators

UniformRandomBitGenerator (C++20)

Engines and engine adaptors

linear_congruential_engine (C++11)

mersenne_twister_engine (C++11)

subtract_with_carry_engine (C++11)

discard_block_engine (C++11)

independent_bits_engine (C++11)

shuffle_order_engine (C++11)

Non-deterministic generator

random_device (C++11)

Distributions

Uniform distributions

uniform_int_distribution (C++11)

uniform_real_distribution (C++11)

generate_canonical (C++11)

Bernoulli distributions

bernoulli_distribution (C++11)

binomial_distribution (C++11)

negative_binomial_distribution (C++11)

geometric_distribution (C++11)

Poisson distributions

poisson_distribution (C++11)

exponential_distribution (C++11)

gamma_distribution (C++11)

weibull_distribution (C++11)

extreme_value_distribution (C++11)

Normal distributions

normal_distribution (C++11)

lognormal_distribution (C++11)

chi_squared_distribution (C++11)

cauchy_distribution (C++11)

fisher_f_distribution (C++11)

student_t_distribution (C++11)

Sampling distributions

discrete_distribution (C++11)

piecewise_constant_distribution (C++11)

piecewise_linear_distribution (C++11)

Seed Sequences

seed_seq (C++11)

C library

rand

srand

RAND_MAX

 

Defined in header <cstdlib>
int rand();

Returns a pseudo-random integral value between ​0​ and RAND_MAX (0 and RAND_MAX included).

std::srand() seeds the pseudo-random number generator used by rand(). If rand() is used before any calls to srand(), rand() behaves as if it was seeded with srand(1).

Each time rand() is seeded with srand(), it must produce the same sequence of values on successive calls. Other functions in the standard library may call rand, it is implementation-defined which functions do so.

It is implementation-defined whether rand() is thread-safe.

Parameters

(none)

Return value

Pseudo-random integral value between ​0​ and RAND_MAX.

Notes

There are no guarantees as to the quality of the random sequence produced. In the past, some implementations of rand() have had serious shortcomings in the randomness, distribution and period of the sequence produced (in one well-known example, the low-order bit simply alternated between 1 and 0 between calls).

rand() is not recommended for serious random-number generation needs. It is recommended to use C++11's random number generation facilities to replace rand(). (since C++11)

Example

Run this code

#include <cstdlib>
#include <iostream>
#include <ctime>
 
int main() 
{
    std::srand(std::time(nullptr)); // use current time as seed for random generator
    int random_variable = std::rand();
    std::cout << "Random value on [0 " << RAND_MAX << "]: " 
              << random_variable << '\n';
 
    // roll a 6-sided die 20 times
    for (int n=0; n != 20; ++n) {
        int x = 7;
        while(x > 6) 
            x = 1 + std::rand()/((RAND_MAX + 1u)/6);  // Note: 1+rand()%6 is biased
        std::cout << x << ' ';
    }
}

Possible output:

Random value on [0 2147483647]: 726295113
6 3 6 2 6 5 6 3 1 1 1 6 6 6 4 1 3 6 4 2

See also

uniform_int_distribution (C++11)	produces integer values evenly distributed across a range (class template)
srand	seeds pseudo-random number generator (function)
RAND_MAX	maximum possible value generated by std::rand (macro constant)
randint	generates a random integer in the specified range (function template)