Track 16 · Lesson 2 of 12

Linear and binary search

Find items by checking each one in turn, or by halving a sorted list again and again, and use the bisect module for sorted data.

You will be able to

• Write a linear search that returns the position of the first match or -1
• Explain why binary search needs sorted data and how it halves the search range
• Implement an iterative binary search without off-by-one errors
• Use bisect_left and bisect_right to find positions and count values in a range