How To Add Element At The Beginning Of LinkedList?

In this article, we will see the addFirst() method of the LinkedList class in Java with an example.

Introduction

LinkedList internally uses doubly linkedlist for storing the variables. That’s why LinkedList is preferred when our frequent operation is insertion and deletion.

To insert the elements with ease at the beginning of the LinkedList, the Language Developers have provided the addFirst() method.

LinkedList addFirst() Method

The addFirst() method will insert the specified element at the beginning of this list.

The method signature for addFirst() method is given below.

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public void addFirst(E e)

Here, e is an element to be added at the beginning of the List.

The return type of this method is void, it means, this method do not return anything.

I have given a simple Java program for the addFirst() method below.

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import java.util.LinkedList;

public class LinkedListAddFirst {

  public static void main(String[] args) {
    LinkedList<String> linkedList = new LinkedList<String>();
    linkedList.add("Austin");
    linkedList.add("Boston");
    linkedList.add("Atlanta");
    linkedList.add("Madison");
    linkedList.add("Columbia");
    
    System.out.println(linkedList);
    
    //Add an element at the beginning
    linkedList.addFirst("Albany");
    System.out.println(linkedList);
  }

}

Output:

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[Austin, Boston, Atlanta, Madison, Columbia]
[Albany, Austin, Boston, Atlanta, Madison, Columbia]

Conclusion

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public void addFirst(E e)

The addFirst() method will insert the specified element at the beginning of this list.

The example Java programs given in the above tutorial can be found at this GitHub Repository.

Let me know your thoughts or suggestions on the topic discussed above in the comment section below.