#1,076 – Implicit Numeric Conversions from the char Type

You can implicitly convert an instance of a char to any of the following numeric types:

ushort , int, uint, long, ulong, float, double, or decimal

When you implicitly convert a char to a numeric value, you use the associated code point as the numeric value.  Because of this implicit conversion, you can use char instances within numeric expressions.  Below are some examples:

            int n = 'a';  // 97
            char c1 = 'a';
            n = c1;  // still 97

            char c2 = '\u1820';
            int n2 = c2;  // 6176 (0x1820)

            int delta = 'd' - 'a';  // 3
            int strangeSum = 'a' + 'b';  // 97 + 98 = 195