Convert Float to String with Precision & Number of Decimal Digits Specified

Convert float to string with precision & number of decimal digits specified?

A typical way would be to use stringstream:

#include <iomanip>
#include <sstream>

double pi = 3.14159265359;
std::stringstream stream;
stream << std::fixed << std::setprecision(2) << pi;
std::string s = stream.str();

See fixed

Use fixed floating-point notation

Sets the floatfield format flag for the str stream to fixed.

When floatfield is set to fixed, floating-point values are written using fixed-point notation: the value is represented with exactly as many digits in the decimal part as specified by the precision field (precision) and with no exponent part.

and setprecision.

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For conversions of technical purpose, like storing data in XML or JSON file, C++17 defines to_chars family of functions.

Assuming a compliant compiler (which we lack at the time of writing),
something like this can be considered:

#include <array>
#include <charconv>

double pi = 3.14159265359;
std::array<char, 128> buffer;
auto [ptr, ec] = std::to_chars(buffer.data(), buffer.data() + buffer.size(), pi,
                               std::chars_format::fixed, 2);
if (ec == std::errc{}) {
    std::string s(buffer.data(), ptr);
    // ....
}
else {
    // error handling
}

Convert floating point number to a certain precision, and then copy to string

With Python < 3 (e.g. 2.6 [see comments] or 2.7), there are two ways to do so.

# Option one
older_method_string = "%.9f" % numvar

# Option two
newer_method_string = "{:.9f}".format(numvar)

But note that for Python versions above 3 (e.g. 3.2 or 3.3), option two is preferred.

For more information on option two, I suggest this link on string formatting from the Python documentation.

And for more information on option one, this link will suffice and has info on the various flags.

Python 3.6 (officially released in December of 2016), added the f string literal, see more information here, which extends the str.format method (use of curly braces such that f"{numvar:.9f}" solves the original problem), that is,

# Option 3 (versions 3.6 and higher)
newest_method_string = f"{numvar:.9f}"

solves the problem. Check out @Or-Duan's answer for more info, but this method is fast.

Convert float to Decimal with fixed digits after decimal

Do all the formatting on the way out from your code, inside the print and write statements. There is no reason I can think of to lose precision (and convert the numbers to some fixed format) while doing numeric calculations inside the code.

Convert float to string with at least one decimal place (javascript)

If you want to append .0 to output from a Number to String conversion and keep precision for non-integers, just test for an integer and treat it specially.

function toNumberString(num) { 
  if (Number.isInteger(num)) { 
    return num + ".0"
  } else {
    return num.toString(); 
  }
}

Input  Output
3      "3.0"
3.4567 "3.4567"

Convert float to string in positional format (without scientific notation and false precision)

Unfortunately it seems that not even the new-style formatting with float.__format__ supports this. The default formatting of floats is the same as with repr; and with f flag there are 6 fractional digits by default:

>>> format(0.0000000005, 'f')
'0.000000'

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However there is a hack to get the desired result - not the fastest one, but relatively simple:

• first the float is converted to a string using str() or repr()
• then a new Decimal instance is created from that string.
• Decimal.__format__ supports f flag which gives the desired result, and, unlike floats it prints the actual precision instead of default precision.

Thus we can make a simple utility function float_to_str:

import decimal

# create a new context for this task
ctx = decimal.Context()

# 20 digits should be enough for everyone :D
ctx.prec = 20

def float_to_str(f):
    """
    Convert the given float to a string,
    without resorting to scientific notation
    """
    d1 = ctx.create_decimal(repr(f))
    return format(d1, 'f')

Care must be taken to not use the global decimal context, so a new context is constructed for this function. This is the fastest way; another way would be to use decimal.local_context but it would be slower, creating a new thread-local context and a context manager for each conversion.

This function now returns the string with all possible digits from mantissa, rounded to the shortest equivalent representation:

>>> float_to_str(0.1)
'0.1'
>>> float_to_str(0.00000005)
'0.00000005'
>>> float_to_str(420000000000000000.0)
'420000000000000000'
>>> float_to_str(0.000000000123123123123123123123)
'0.00000000012312312312312313'

The last result is rounded at the last digit

As @Karin noted, float_to_str(420000000000000000.0) does not strictly match the format expected; it returns 420000000000000000 without trailing .0.

How to nicely format floating numbers to string without unnecessary decimal 0's

If the idea is to print integers stored as doubles as if they are integers, and otherwise print the doubles with the minimum necessary precision:

public static String fmt(double d)
{
    if(d == (long) d)
        return String.format("%d",(long)d);
    else
        return String.format("%s",d);
}

Produces:

232
0.18
1237875192
4.58
0
1.2345

And does not rely on string manipulation.

Rounding a float to one decimal place then convert to a string

You can use ostringstream for this purpose. Not forget to include <sstream>.

Code snippet:

string RoundNumber(float result)
{
    std::ostringstream out;
    out<<std::setprecision(1)<<std::fixed<<std::showpoint<< result;
    std::string RoundResult =  out.str();
    return RoundResult;
}

Fixed digits after decimal with f-strings

Include the type specifier in your format expression:

>>> a = 10.1234
>>> f'{a:.2f}'
'10.12'

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