std::minmax_element

Defined in header `<algorithm>`
template< class ForwardIt > std::pair<ForwardIt,ForwardIt> minmax_element( ForwardIt first, ForwardIt last );	(1)	(since C++11)
template< class ForwardIt, class Compare > std::pair<ForwardIt,ForwardIt> minmax_element( ForwardIt first, ForwardIt last, Compare comp );	(2)	(since C++11)

Finds the greatest and the smallest element in the range [first, last). The first version uses operator< to compare the values, the second version uses the given comparison function comp.

first, last	-	forward iterators defining the range to examine
cmp	-	comparison function object (i.e. an object that satisfies the requirements of `Compare`) which returns true if if `a` is less* than `*b`. The signature of the comparison function should be equivalent to the following: bool cmp(const Type1 &a, const Type2 &b); The signature does not need to have const &, but the function object must not modify the objects passed to it. The types Type1 and Type2 must be such that an object of type ForwardIt can be dereferenced and then implicitly converted to both of them.
Type requirements
- `ForwardIt` must meet the requirements of `ForwardIterator`.

[edit] Return value

a pair consisting of an iterator to the smallest element as the first element and an iterator to the greatest element as the second. Returns std::make_pair(first, first) if the range is empty. If several elements are equivalent to the smallest element, the iterator to the first such element is returned. If several elements are equivalent to the largest element, the iterator to the last such element is returned.

[edit] Complexity

At most $max(floor(3/2(N-1)), 0)$ applications of the predicate, where N = std::distance(first, last).

[edit] Notes

This algorithm is different from std::make_pair(std::min_element(), std::max_element()), not only in efficiency, but also in that this algorithm finds the last biggest element while std::max_element finds the first biggest element.

[edit] Possible implementation

First version

template<class ForwardIt>
std::pair<ForwardIt, ForwardIt> 
    minmax_element(ForwardIt first, ForwardIt last)
{
    return std::minmax_element(first, last, std::less<>());
}

Second version

template<class ForwardIt, class Compare>
std::pair<ForwardIt, ForwardIt> 
    minmax_element(ForwardIt first, ForwardIt last, Compare comp)
{
    std::pair<ForwardIt, ForwardIt> result(first, first);
 
    if (first == last) return result;
    if (++first == last) return result;
 
    if (comp(*first, *result.first)) {
        result.first = first;
    } else {
        result.second = first;
    }
    while (++first != last) {
        ForwardIt i = first;
        if (++first == last) {
            if (comp(*i, *result.first)) result.first = i;
            else if (!(comp(*i, *result.second))) result.second = i;
            break;
        } else {
            if (comp(*first, *i)) {
                if (comp(*first, *result.first)) result.first = first;
                if (!(comp(*i, *result.second))) result.second = i;
            } else {
                if (comp(*i, *result.first)) result.first = i;
                if (!(comp(*first, *result.second))) result.second = first;
            }
        }
    }
    return result;
}

[edit] Example

Run this code

#include <algorithm>
#include <iostream>
#include <vector>
 
int main()
{
    std::vector<int> v = { 3, 9, 1, 4, 2, 5, 9 };
 
    auto result = std::minmax_element(v.begin(), v.end());
    std::cout << "min element at: " << (result.first - v.begin()) << '\n';
    std::cout << "max element at: " << (result.second - v.begin()) << '\n';
}

Output:

min element at: 2
max element at: 6

[edit] See also

min_element	returns the smallest element in a range (function template)
max_element	returns the largest element in a range (function template)

Language
Standard library headers
Concepts
Utilities library
Strings library
Containers library
Algorithms library
Iterators library
Numerics library
Input/output library
Localizations library
Regular expressions library (C++11)
Atomic operations library (C++11)
Thread support library (C++11)