Kotlin List minus()
Syntax & Examples

Syntax of List.minus()

There are 4 variations for the syntax of List.minus() extension function. They are:

operator fun <T> Iterable<T>.minus(element: T): List<T>

This extension function returns a list containing all elements of the original collection without the first occurrence of the given element.

operator fun <T> Iterable<T>.minus( elements: Array<out T> ): List<T>

This extension function returns a list containing all elements of the original collection except the elements contained in the given elements array.

operator fun <T> Iterable<T>.minus( elements: Iterable<T> ): List<T>

This extension function returns a list containing all elements of the original collection except the elements contained in the given elements collection.

operator fun <T> Iterable<T>.minus( elements: Sequence<T> ): List<T>

This extension function returns a list containing all elements of the original collection except the elements contained in the given elements sequence.

✐ Examples

1 Example

In this example,

We create a list named list1 containing the numbers [1, 2, 3, 4, 5].
We apply the minus function with the element 3 to remove it from the list.
The resulting list, after removing the first occurrence of 3, is stored in result.
Finally, we print the value of result to standard output using the print statement.

Kotlin Program

fun main(args: Array<String>) {
    val list1 = listOf(1, 2, 3, 4, 5);
    val result = list1.minus(3);
    print(result);
}

Output

[1, 2, 4, 5]

2 Example

In this example,

We create a list named list1 containing the characters ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e'].
We apply the minus function with an array containing elements 'a', 'c', and 'e' to remove them from the list.
The resulting list, after removing the specified elements, is stored in result.
Finally, we print the value of result to standard output using the print statement.

Kotlin Program

fun main(args: Array<String>) {
    val list1 = listOf('a', 'b', 'c', 'd', 'e');
    val result = list1.minus(arrayOf('a', 'c', 'e'));
    print(result);
}

Output

[b, d]

3 Example

In this example,

We create a list named list1 containing the strings ['apple', 'banana', 'orange', 'grape'].
We apply the minus function with another list containing elements 'orange' and 'grape' to remove them from the list.
The resulting list, after removing the specified elements, is stored in result.
Finally, we print the value of result to standard output using the print statement.

Kotlin Program

fun main(args: Array<String>) {
    val list1 = listOf("apple", "banana", "orange", "grape");
    val result = list1.minus(listOf("orange", "grape"));
    print(result);
}

Output

[apple, banana]

Summary

In this Kotlin tutorial, we learned about minus() extension function of List: the syntax and few working examples with output and detailed explanation for each example.