Line Continuation in Python

1. Line Continuation With Explicit Line Break in Python
2. Line Continuation With () in Python

In this tutorial, we will discuss methods for line continuation in Python.

Line Continuation With Explicit Line Break in Python

The \ operator, also known as an explicit line break, can be used to break a single continued long line into many smaller and easy-to-read lines of code. The following code example shows us how we can add a line break for line continuation in Python.

string = "This" + " is" + " a" + " string" \
+ " with" + " a" + " double" + " line" + " value"

print(string)

Output:

This is a string with a double line value

We broke down a long line of strings into two smaller and easy-to-read lines with an explicit line break in the above code. It can also be done with other types of variables, as shown in the example below.

i = 1 + 2 \
+ 3

x = 1.1 + 2.2 \
+ 3.3

print(i)
print(x)

Output:

6
6.6

The only problem with this approach is that it gives the error SyntaxError: unexpected character after line continuation character if there is a blank space after the \.

Line Continuation With () in Python

Another method that can be used for line continuation is to enclose the lines inside (). The following code example shows us how we can use () for line continuation in Python.

string = ("This" + " is" + " a" + " string" 
+ " with" + " a" + " double" + " line" + " value")

print(string)

Output:

This is a string with a double line value

In the above code, we broke down a long line of strings into two smaller and easy-to-read lines by enclosing the lines inside the (). This can also be done with other types of variables, as shown in the example below.

i = (1 + 2
+ 3)

x = (1.1 + 2.2
+ 3.3)

print(i)
print(x)

Output:

6
6.6

According to the official Python style guide, the () approach is much more preferable than the explicit line break.