Convert an Integer to Binary in C#

This post will discuss how to convert an integer to a 32-bit binary string in C#.

There are several ways to convert an integer to binary format in C#:

1. Using `Convert.ToString()` method

The recommended approach is to use the built-in method Convert.ToString for converting a signed integer value to its equivalent string representation in a specified base. The base must be one of 2, 8, 10, or 16; otherwise, an ArgumentException is thrown. This method is demonstrated below:

using System;

public class Example

{

public static void Main()

{

int val = -1;

string binary = Convert.ToString(val, 2);

Console.WriteLine(binary);

}

Output: 11111111111111111111111111111111

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This method can be extended to convert from any base to any base in C# where the base must be 2, 8, 10, or 16.

using System;

public class Example

{

public static void Main()

{

string val = "100";

int from = 10;

int to = 2;

string binary = Convert.ToString(Convert.ToInt32(val, from), to);

Console.WriteLine(binary);

}

Output: 1100100

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2. Custom routine

We can also write our own custom routine to convert an unsigned integer to its equivalent string representation.

using System;

public class Example

{

public static string ToBinary(int x)

{

char[] buff = new char[32];

for (int i = 31; i >= 0 ; i--)

{

int mask = 1 << i;

buff[31 - i] = (x & mask) != 0 ? '1' : '0';

}

return new string(buff);

}

public static void Main()

{

int val = 1000; // unsigned integer

string binary = ToBinary(val);

Console.WriteLine(binary);

}

Output: 00000000000000000000001111101000

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That’s all about converting an integer to Binary in C#.

Convert an Integer to Binary in C#

1. Using Convert.ToString() method

2. Custom routine

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1. Using `Convert.ToString()` method