Pythonic way to detect final iteration of a loop

Question

Currently, I do something like

count = 0
for item in list:
  if count == len(list) - 1:
      <do something>
   else:
      <do something else>
   count += 1

Is there a more Pythonic way to recognize the final iteration of a loop - for both lists and dictionaries?

Do you really need to know if its the last element? Usually you can get around this by using `', '.join(list)` for example. — Caramiriel, Jul 22 '19 at 08:18
@T.Nel it wasn't flagged as unhelpful, it was flagged as a duplicate, which it is. — juanpa.arrivillaga, Jul 22 '19 at 08:33
@Mawg of the two questions linked to as duplicates at the top. — juanpa.arrivillaga, Jul 22 '19 at 10:49

score 5 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 22 '19 at 08:15

5

You can improve on it using enumerate():

for i, item in enumerate(list):
    if i == len(list) - 1:
        <do something>
    else:
        <do something else>

answered Jul 22 '19 at 08:15

LeopardShark

1

you only need to calculate last item in list once `last_item = list[-1]` – Erik K Jul 22 '19 at 08:24

1 Answers1