Constant expressions

Constant expressions may contain only constant operands and are evaluated at compile time.

Untyped boolean, numeric, and string constants may be used as operands wherever it is legal to use an operand of boolean, numeric, or string type, respectively.

A constant comparison always yields an untyped boolean constant. If the left operand of a constant shift expression is an untyped constant, the result is an integer constant; otherwise it is a constant of the same type as the left operand, which must be of integer type.

Any other operation on untyped constants results in an untyped constant of the same kind; that is, a boolean, integer, floating-point, complex, or string constant. If the untyped operands of a binary operation (other than a shift) are of different kinds, the result is of the operand's kind that appears later in this list: integer, rune, floating-point, complex. For example, an untyped integer constant divided by an untyped complex constant yields an untyped complex constant.

const a = 2 + 3.0          // a == 5.0   (untyped floating-point constant)
const b = 15 / 4           // b == 3     (untyped integer constant)
const c = 15 / 4.0         // c == 3.75  (untyped floating-point constant)
const Θ float64 = 3/2      // Θ == 1.0   (type float64, 3/2 is integer division)
const Π float64 = 3/2\.     // Π == 1.5   (type float64, 3/2\. is float division)
const d = 1 > 1  // illegal    (float64(2) is a typed floating-point constant)
const h = "foo" > "bar"    // h == true  (untyped boolean constant)
const j = true             // j == true  (untyped boolean constant)
const k = 'w' + 1          // k == 'x'   (untyped rune constant)
const l = "hi"             // l == "hi"  (untyped string constant)
const m = string(k)        // m == "x"   (type string)
const Σ = 1 - 0.707i       //            (untyped complex constant)
const Δ = Σ + 2.0e-4       //            (untyped complex constant)
const Φ = iota*1i - 1/1i   //            (untyped complex constant)

Applying the built-in function complex to untyped integer, rune, or floating-point constants yields an untyped complex constant.

const ic = complex(0, c)   // ic == 3.75i  (untyped complex constant)
const iΘ = complex(0, Θ)   // iΘ == 1i     (type complex128)

Constant expressions are always evaluated exactly; intermediate values and the constants themselves may require precision significantly larger than supported by any predeclared type in the language. The following are legal declarations:

const Huge = 1 > 98  // Four == 4                                (type int8)

The divisor of a constant division or remainder operation must not be zero:

3.14 / 0.0   // illegal: division by zero

The values of typed constants must always be accurately representable by values of the constant type. The following constant expressions are illegal:

uint(-1)     // -1 cannot be represented as a uint
int(3.14)    // 3.14 cannot be represented as an int
int64(Huge)  // 1267650600228229401496703205376 cannot be represented as an int64
Four * 300   // operand 300 cannot be represented as an int8 (type of Four)
Four * 100   // product 400 cannot be represented as an int8 (type of Four)

The mask used by the unary bitwise complement operator ^ matches the rule for non-constants: the mask is all 1s for unsigned constants and -1 for signed and untyped constants.

^1         // untyped integer constant, equal to -2
uint8(^1)  // illegal: same as uint8(-2), -2 cannot be represented as a uint8
^uint8(1)  // typed uint8 constant, same as 0xFF ^ uint8(1) = uint8(0xFE)
int8(^1)   // same as int8(-2)
^int8(1)   // same as -1 ^ int8(1) = -2

Implementation restriction: A compiler may use rounding while computing untyped floating-point or complex constant expressions; see the implementation restriction in the section on constants. This rounding may cause a floating-point constant expression to be invalid in an integer context, even if it would be integral when calculated using infinite precision, and vice versa.