The symmetric difference of two sets A and B is the set of elements that are in either A or B, but not in their intersection.
The syntax of symmetric_difference() is:
A.symmetric_difference(B)
Example 1: Working of symmetric_difference()
A = {'a', 'b', 'c', 'd'}
B = {'c', 'd', 'e' }
C = {}
print(A.symmetric_difference(B))
print(B.symmetric_difference(A))
print(A.symmetric_difference(C))
print(B.symmetric_difference(C))
Output
{'b', 'a', 'e'}
{'b', 'e', 'a'}
{'b', 'd', 'c', 'a'}
{'d', 'e', 'c'}
Symmetric difference using ^ operator
In Python, we can also find the symmetric difference using the ^ operator.
A = {'a', 'b', 'c', 'd'}
B = {'c', 'd', 'e' }
print(A ^ B)
print(B ^ A)
print(A ^ A)
print(B ^ B)
Output
{'e', 'a', 'b'}
{'e', 'a', 'b'}
set()
set()