C program to find the largest and smallest number in an array

In this article we will learn to implement a C program to find the largest and smallest number in an array. A C program is given below which reads a list of integers and prints the largest and smallest number.

The program is:

/*
 * C program to find the largest and smallest numbers in an array of integers
 * Author: P.S.SuryaTeja
*/
#include <stdio.h>
#include <conio.h>
#include <math.h>
#include <stdlib.h>

int smallest(int a[], int n)
{
	int min, i;
	min = a[0];
	for(i = 1; i < n; i++)
	{
		if(min > a[i])
			min = a[i];
	}
	return min;
}

int largest(int a[], int n)
{
	int max, i;
	max = a[0];
	for(i = 1; i < n; i++)
	{
		if(max < a[i])
			max = a[i];
	}
	return max;
}

int main(int argc, char **argv)
{
	int a[10], n, i;
	printf("Enter a number between 1 and 10: ");
	scanf("%d", &n);
	printf("Enter %d numbers: ", n);
	for(i = 0; i < n; i++)
		scanf("%d", &a[i]);
	printf("\nSmallest element in the array is: %d", smallest(a, n));
	printf("\nLargest element in the array is: %d", largest(a, n));
    getch();
    return 0;
}

Input and output for the above program is as follows:

Enter a number between 1 and 10: 5
Enter 5 numbers: 2 3 1 5 4

Smallest element in the array is: 1
Largest element in the array is: 5

Suryateja Pericherla

Suryateja Pericherla, at present is a Research Scholar (full-time Ph.D.) in the Dept. of Computer Science & Systems Engineering at Andhra University, Visakhapatnam. Previously worked as an Associate Professor in the Dept. of CSE at Vishnu Institute of Technology, India.

He has 11+ years of teaching experience and is an individual researcher whose research interests are Cloud Computing, Internet of Things, Computer Security, Network Security and Blockchain.

He is a member of professional societies like IEEE, ACM, CSI and ISCA. He published several research papers which are indexed by SCIE, WoS, Scopus, Springer and others.