This lesson's interactive features are locked, please to keep using them

Variables

Variables are how we store data as our program runs. Up 'til now we've been printing data by passing it straight into print(). Now we're going to save the data in variables so we can reuse it and change it before printing it.

Creating Variables

A "variable" is just a name that we give to a value. For example, we can make a new variable named my_height and set its value to 100:

my_height = 100

Or we can define a variable called my_name and set it to the text string "Lane":

my_name = "Lane"

We have the freedom to choose any name for our variables, but they should be descriptive and consist of a single "token", meaning continuous text with underscores separating the words.

Using Variables

Once we have a variable, we can access its value by using its name. For example, this will print 100:

print(my_height)

And this will print Lane:

print(my_name)

Assignment

We need to keep track of our hero's health!

On the first line of code, create a new variable named exactly player_health and set it equal to 1000.