strdup function

C

Function

Reference manual

@see man strdup

The strdup function allocates memory for a new string and duplicates the content of the provided string. It returns a pointer to the newly created string. The memory allocated by strdup should be released using free when it is no longer needed.

Syntax

char *strdup(const char *str);

Parameters

• str: The input string to be duplicated.

Return value

Returns a pointer to a new string containing a copy of the input string. If memory allocation fails, it returns NULL.

Example

In the following example we use the strdup function to create a copy of the string “Hello, World!” and we output both the original and the copy in case the memory allocation was successful, else we output an error message.

#include <stdio.h>
#include <string.h>
#include <stdlib.h>

int main(void) {
    const char *original = "Hello, World!";
    char *duplicate = strdup(original);

    if (duplicate != NULL) {
        printf("Original: %s\n", original);
        printf("Duplicate: %s\n", duplicate);
        free(duplicate);
    } else {
        printf("Memory allocation failed.\n");
    }
    return (0);
}