What is the difference between printf, sprintf and fprintf?

printf:
printf function is used to print character stream of data on stdout console.

Syntax :

 int printf(const char* str, ...); 

Example :

// simple print on stdout
#include<stdio.h>
int main()
{
   printf("hello geeksquiz");
   return 0;
}

Output :

 hello geeksquiz

sprintf:
Syntax:

int sprintf(char *str, const char *string,...); 

String print function instead of printing on console store it on char buffer which are specified in sprintf

Example :

// Example program to demonstrate sprintf()
#include<stdio.h>
int main()
{
    char buffer[50];
    int a = 10, b = 20, c;
    c = a + b;
    sprintf(buffer, "Sum of %d and %d is %d", a, b, c);

    // The string "sum of 10 and 20 is 30" is stored
    // into buffer instead of printing on stdout
    printf("%s", buffer);

    return 0;
}

Output :

Sum of 10 and 20 is 30

fprintf:
fprintf is used to print the string content in file but not on stdout console.

int fprintf(FILE *fptr, const char *str, ...);

Example :

#include<stdio.h>
int main()
{
    int i, n=2;
    char str[50];

    //open file sample.txt in write mode
    FILE *fptr = fopen("sample.txt", "w");
    if (fptr == NULL)
    {
        printf("Could not open file");
        return 0;
    }

    for (i=0; i<n; i++)
    {
        puts("Enter a name");
        gets(str);
        fprintf(fptr,"%d.%s\n", i, str);
    }
    fclose(fptr);

    return 0;
}

Input: GeeksforGeeks
       GeeksQuiz
Output :  sample.txt file now having output as 
0. GeeksforGeeks
1. GeeksQuiz

Thank you for reading, i will soon update with scanf, fscanf, sscanf keep tuned.

This article is contributed by Vankayala Karunakar. Please write comments if you find anything incorrect, or you want to share more information about the topic discussed above.

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