Java: get greatest common divisor

Unless I have Guava, I define like this:

int gcd(int a, int b) {
  return a == 0 ? b : gcd(b % a, a);
}

As far as I know, there isn't any built-in method for primitives. But something as simple as this should do the trick:

public int gcd(int a, int b) {
   if (b==0) return a;
   return gcd(b,a%b);
}

You can also one-line it if you're into that sort of thing:

public int gcd(int a, int b) { return b==0 ? a : gcd(b, a%b); }

It should be noted that there is absolutely no difference between the two as they compile to the same byte code.


For int and long, as primitives, not really. For Integer, it is possible someone wrote one.

Given that BigInteger is a (mathematical/functional) superset of int, Integer, long, and Long, if you need to use these types, convert them to a BigInteger, do the GCD, and convert the result back.

private static int gcdThing(int a, int b) {
    BigInteger b1 = BigInteger.valueOf(a);
    BigInteger b2 = BigInteger.valueOf(b);
    BigInteger gcd = b1.gcd(b2);
    return gcd.intValue();
}

Or the Euclidean algorithm for calculating the GCD...

public int egcd(int a, int b) {
    if (a == 0)
        return b;

    while (b != 0) {
        if (a > b)
            a = a - b;
        else
            b = b - a;
    }

    return a;
}