Int32

Int32 is a 32-bit signed integer data type used in the .NET framework and related languages. It is exposed as the System.Int32 structure, and in C# the keyword int is an alias for this type. The type occupies four bytes of memory and uses two's complement representation for negative values, which governs how overflow behaves and how bitwise operations operate.

The value range of Int32 spans from -2,147,483,648 to 2,147,483,647. In hexadecimal form, the minimum is 0x80000000 and the maximum is 0x7FFFFFFF. When stored in memory, the byte order depends on the system’s endianness, but the numeric value remains the same.

Int32 is commonly used for numeric calculations, indexing, and loop counters, and it serves as the default integer type in many APIs and data structures. Arithmetic on Int32 values follows language rules for overflow: in C#, arithmetic is unchecked by default, so overflows wrap around; in a checked context, an OverflowException is thrown.

In addition to basic usage, Int32 can be parsed from strings using methods like TryParse, and converted to strings with ToString. It can be cast to wider types or to unsigned types (e.g., UInt32) with explicit conversion as needed.

Compared to UInt32, Int32 represents negative values and has a symmetric range around zero. While Int32 is specific to .NET, other languages provide separate 32-bit signed integer types, such as int32_t in C/C++ and Java’s int, which is also 32-bit signed but not the same type as .NET’s Int32.