wcscmp(3)

✨ wcscmp(3) ✨

okay bestie, pull up a chair because today we're getting into wcscmp, straight out of the Library Functions Manual 💖 she lives in the Standard C library (libc, -lc) and she is here to compare wide-character strings. no cap. 🦋

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🌸 NAME 🌸

wcscmp — compare two wide-character strings 👑

📚 LIBRARY 📚

Standard C library (libc, -lc) 💅

🎀 SYNOPSIS 🎀

#include <wchar.h>

int wcscmp(const wchar_t *s1, const wchar_t *s2);

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

so, the way that wcscmp() works is basically the wide-character equivalent of strcmp(3). that's the whole vibe. it compares the wide-character string pointed to by s1 and the wide-character string pointed to by s2, and it is obsessed with finding the first spot where they differ. 😭✨

🔥 RETURN VALUE 🔥

the results are giving very specific, okurrr:

• wcscmp() returns zero if the wide-character strings at s1 and s2 are equal 🫶 — slay, they matched.
• at the first differing position i, it returns an integer greater than zero if the corresponding wide-character s1[i] is greater than s2[i]. 💪
• at the first differing position i, it returns an integer less than zero if the corresponding wide-character s1[i] is less than s2[i]. 🥀

that's it, that's the whole personality. no grey area, just sign. periodt. 💀

👑 ATTRIBUTES 👑

for an explanation of the terms used in this section, go peek at attributes(7) — she's the reference bestie for all this terminology. 🧚

• Interface: wcscmp()
• Attribute: Thread safety
• Value: MT-Safe 🌈

ngl MT-Safe is iconic behaviour, we love a thread-safe queen. 👑

⭐ STANDARDS ⭐

C11, POSIX.1-2008. 📜✨

🦋 HISTORY 🦋

POSIX.1-2001, C99. so she's been around, she's got history, she's a legacy main character fr fr. 🌸

🌈 SEE ALSO 🌈

• strcmp(3)
• wcscasecmp(3)
• wmemcmp(3)

iykyk, go read those next, they're all in the same friend group. 💜

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Linux man-pages 6.20 · 2026-02-08 · wcscmp(3) — ok that's the whole page bestie, tysm for reading, go compare some wide-character strings responsibly, mwah 💅💖🎀