INT16 - 16-Bit Signed Integer | Integer Format Guide

Bit Layout

Sign

S

1 bit

Value

V

15 bits

A 16-bit integer uses 16 bits to store a whole number. For INT16 (signed), the most significant bit is the sign bit using two's complement. For the unsigned variant, see UINT16.

Overview

16-bit integers are widely used where the range of ±32,767 or 0–65,535 is sufficient and memory conservation matters. They are the short type in C/C++ and Java.

Common Uses

Audio samples: CD-quality audio (16-bit PCM) stores each sample as an INT16, giving 65,536 amplitude levels and ~96 dB dynamic range.
Embedded systems: 16-bit microcontrollers (MSP430, PIC24) use INT16 as their native integer type.
Sensor data: Accelerometers, gyroscopes, and temperature sensors commonly output signed 16-bit readings where negative values represent opposite directions or below-zero temperatures.

Audio connection When you listen to a CD or most digital audio, each sample is an INT16. The 65,536 possible values give enough resolution that the quantization noise is below human hearing threshold at normal listening levels.

Range & Properties

Property	Signed (INT16)	Unsigned (UINT16)
Total Bits	16	16
Minimum Value	-32,768	0
Maximum Value	32,767	65,535
Representable Values	65,536	65,536

Key Bit Patterns

Value	Bit Pattern	Signed	Unsigned
Zero	0000000000000000	0	0
One	0000000000000001	1	1
Max Unsigned	1111111111111111	-1	65535
Max Signed	0111111111111111	32767	32767
All Ones (-1)	1111111111111111	-1	65535
Min Signed (-32768)	1000000000000000	-32768	32768

Interactive Bit Visualizer

Click any bit to flip it. See both signed and unsigned interpretations.

Decimal:

Hex:

Format Comparison

Property	INT16	INT32	INT8	INT4
Total Bits	16	32	8	4
Signed Min	-32,768	-2,147,483,648	-128	-8
Signed Max	32,767	2,147,483,647	127	7
Unsigned Max	65,535	4,294,967,295	255	15
Step (ULP)	1	1	1	1
Values	65,536	4,294,967,296	256	16

Where INT16 Is Used

GPU packed operations: The PTX ISA 9.2 introduces .s16x2 packed types (two signed 16-bit integers in a 32-bit register) with add/sub/min/max and .sat qualifier support.
Audio processing: 16-bit signed PCM is the standard for CD-quality audio (44.1 kHz, 96 dB dynamic range) and most digital audio pipelines.
ML frameworks: PyTorch provides torch.int16 for signed 16-bit tensor storage. The ONNX specification defines INT16 = 5 as a tensor data type.
AMD GPU dot-product: The MLIR AMDGPU dialect supports i16 × i16 → i32 signed dot-product (sdot2) operations on gfx906+ architectures.