The Wolfram Language provides a carefully chosen set of functions for accessing elements of lists using either indices or positions, or using patterns or criteria for their values.

list[[...]] (Part ) — parts of lists, resettable with =

Span (;; ) — general specification for spans or blocks of elements

First   ▪ Last   ▪ Rest   ▪ Most   ▪ Take   ▪ Drop   ▪ TakeDrop   ▪ TakeList   ▪ TakeWhile

UpTo — a certain number of elements, or as many as are available

Append   ▪ Prepend   ▪ Insert   ▪ Delete   ▪ AppendTo   ▪ PrependTo

Position — find positions of elements matching a pattern

PositionSmallest , PositionLargest — find positions of the smallest or largest elements

FirstPosition   ▪ Extract   ▪ ReplacePart   ▪ MapAt   ▪ ArrayRules   ▪ Ordering

Length   ▪ Dimensions   ▪ ArrayDepth   ▪ LengthWhile

Select , SelectFirst — select elements that satisfy a criterion

Cases , FirstCase — give elements that match a pattern

Pick   ▪ BinLists   ▪ Count   ▪ Gather   ▪ Tally

DeleteCases   ▪ DeleteElements   ▪ DeleteDuplicates   ▪ DeleteAdjacentDuplicates

Nothing — an element automatically removed from lists

MemberQ — test whether an element is a member of a list

FreeQ   ▪ ArrayQ   ▪ VectorQ   ▪ MatrixQ

AllTrue   ▪ AnyTrue   ▪ NoneTrue

Max   ▪ Min   ▪ MaximalBy   ▪ MinimalBy

Finding Sublists

SequencePosition   ▪ SequenceCases   ▪ SequenceCount

Finding Subsets

SubsetPosition   ▪ SubsetCases   ▪ SubsetCount

Related Tech Notes

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• Manipulating Elements of Lists
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• Adding, Removing, and Modifying List Elements
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• Getting Pieces of Lists
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• Testing and Searching List Elements
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• Manipulating Lists by Their Indices

Related Guides

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• Parts of Matrices
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• Parts of Expressions
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• Rearranging & Restructuring Lists
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• Constructing Lists
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• Handling Arrays of Data

Related Links

• Demonstrations related to Elements of Lists (Wolfram Demonstrations Project)