How do I find the mode of a list or tuple without the frequency?

Question

I'm trying to find the most occurring number in a tuple and assign that value to a variable. I tried the following code, but it gives me the frequency and the mode, when I only need the mode.

from collections import Counter
self.mode_counter = Counter(self.numbers)
self.mode = self.mode_counter.most_common(1)

print self.mode

Is there a way to just assign the mode to self.mode using Counter?

Here's an answer for a similar question with interesting soluitions: [link](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/1518522/python-most-common-element-in-a-list) — Maciek, Jan 10 '14 at 15:16

score 4 · Answer 1 · answered Jan 10 '14 at 15:06

4

Just unpack the return value of most_common.

[(mode, _)] = mode_counter.most_common(1)

answered Jan 10 '14 at 15:06

Fred Foo

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Why the `[]` on the left hand side? – Jakob Bowyer Jan 10 '14 at 15:09
Stumped me at first, too. The result is a list of tuples. – tobias_k Jan 10 '14 at 15:09
1

@JakobBowyer print `mode_counter.most_common()` to see the intuition. – C.B. Jan 10 '14 at 15:10
Cute. Ill remember that next time – Jakob Bowyer Jan 10 '14 at 15:12

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Jan 10 '14 at 15:09

2

most_common(1) returns a list of 1 tuple.

You have two possibilities:

Use self.mode, _ = self.mode_counter.most_common(1)[0] to discard the second value

Use self.mode = self.mode_counter.most_common(1)[0][0] to only get the first value

answered Jan 10 '14 at 15:09

sphere

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How do I find the mode of a list or tuple without the frequency?

2 Answers2