Python – Union of two or more Lists

Python | Union of two or more Lists

Union of a list means, we must take all the elements from list A and list B (there can be more than two lists) and put them inside a single new list. There are various orders in which we can combine the lists. For e.g., we can maintain the repetition and order or remove the repeated elements in the final list and so on.
Examples:

Maintained repetition only
Input : 
lst1 = [23, 15, 2, 14, 14, 16, 20 ,52]
lst2 = [2, 48, 15, 12, 26, 32, 47, 54]
Output :
[23, 15, 2, 14, 14, 16, 20, 52, 2, 48, 
15, 12, 26, 32, 47, 54]

Maintained repetition and order
Input : 
lst1 = [23, 15, 2, 14, 14, 16, 20 ,52]
lst2 = [2, 48, 15, 12, 26, 32, 47, 54]
Output :
[2, 2, 12, 14, 14, 15, 15, 16, 20, 23, 
26, 32, 47, 48, 52, 54]

Without repetition
Input : 
lst1 = [23, 15, 2, 14, 14, 16, 20 ,52]
lst2 = [2, 48, 15, 12, 26, 32, 47, 54]
Output :
[32, 2, 12, 14, 15, 16, 48, 47, 20, 52, 54, 23, 26]

Union of three lists
Input : 
lst1 = [23, 15, 2, 14, 14, 16, 20 ,52]
lst2 = [2, 48, 15, 12, 26, 32, 47, 54]
lst3 = [4, 78, 5, 6, 9, 25, 64, 32, 59]
Output :
[32, 64, 2, 4, 5, 6, 9, 12, 14, 15, 16, 
48, 47, 78, 20, 52, 54, 23, 25, 26, 59]

Maintaining Repetition

Output:

[23, 15, 2, 14, 14, 16, 20, 52, 2, 48, 15, 
12, 26, 32, 47, 54]

Maintaining both Repetition and Order

To maintain the order of appearance in the new list we need to use the sorted() function, passing the addition of two lists(plus operated, as in the previous problem) as parameters.

Output:

[2, 2, 12, 14, 14, 15, 15, 16, 20, 23, 26, 32, 47, 48, 52, 54]

Without Repetition

To get rid of all the repetitive elements from the initial list, we use the set() function on both the lists, individually. Then we add them using the “+” operator and pass as a new list.

Output:

[32, 2, 12, 14, 15, 16, 48, 47, 20, 
52, 54, 23, 26]

More than two lists

We can also make an union of more than two lists. This can be done efficiently by using both the set() and union() function, simultaneously, as shown in the below example. This also takes care of the repetition and prevents them.

Output:

[32, 64, 2, 4, 5, 6, 9, 12, 14, 15, 16, 
48, 47, 78, 20, 52, 54, 23, 25, 26, 59]

Last Updated on November 1, 2021 by admin