Memory alignment

The tendency for hardware to prefer¹ that, when given the size of a Data type, the variable with that data type is stored at an address that is a multiple of that size.

Example

A variable with a 4-byte data type should be stored beginning at an address that is a multiple of 4 bytes.

While this isn’t always the case, both hardware and software try very hard to make this happen. For instance, see Memory alignment.

Footnotes

1. Meaning, will run more efficiently. ↩