Python: Difference between filter(function, sequence) and map(function, sequence)

list(map(cube, range(1, 11)))

is equivalent to

[cube(1), cube(2), ..., cube(10)]

While the list returned by

list(filter(f, range(2, 25)))

is equivalent to result after running

result = []
for i in range(2, 25):
    if f(i):
        result.append(i)

Notice that when using map, the items in the result are values returned by the function cube.

In contrast, the values returned by f in filter(f, ...) are not the items in result. f(i) is only used to determine if the value i should be kept in result.

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In Python2, map and filter return lists. In Python3, map and filter return iterators. Above, list(map(...)) and list(filter(...)) is used to ensure the result is a list.

filter(), as its name suggests, filters the original iterable and retents the items that returns True for the function provided to filter().

map() on the other hand, apply the supplied function to each element of the iterable and return a list of results for each element.

Follows the example that you gave, let's compare them:

>>> def f(x): return x % 2 != 0 and x % 3 != 0
>>> range(11)
[0, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10]
>>> map(f, range(11))  # the ones that returns TRUE are 1, 5 and 7
[False, True, False, False, False, True, False, True, False, False, False]
>>> filter(f, range(11))  # So, filter returns 1, 5 and 7
[1, 5, 7]

map and filter function in python is pretty different because they perform very differently. Let's have a quick example to differentiate them.

map function

Let's define a function which will take a string argument and check whether it presents in vowel letter sequences.

def lit(word):
    return word in 'aeiou'

Now let's create a map function for this and pass some random string.

for item in map(lit,['a','b','e']):
    print(item)

And yes it's equivalent to following

lit('a') , lit('b') , lit('e')

simply it will print

True
False
True 

filter function

Now let's create a filter function for this and pass some random string.

for item in filter(lit,['a','b','e']):
    print(item)

filter as the name implies, filters the original iterable and retents the items that return True for the function provided to the filter function.

Simply it will print

a
e

Fork it here for future reference, if you find this useful.