Introduction
C++ was built as an extension to C and gave programmers a high control over memory and system resources. If you know any other programming language, C++ will be easy to learn. Even otherwise, C++ is a friendly language, and you can learn it through some hands-on projects and practice.
This article lists 10 C++ projects of different levels, which will help you appreciate the language more. You can also try many other similar projects. For example, one of our projects is Bookshop inventory management. You can try a library management system as well on the same lines. Again, similar to the railway ticket reservation system, you can try out the Bus ticket reservation system.
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What is C++?
C++ is an OOPs based programming language, much suitable for building high-performance applications. C++ finds its use in applications that need high speed and accuracy, for example, operating systems, gaming applications, Graphical User Interface (GUI), and embedded systems. The most popular IDE for C++ in Visual Studio will be used for the projects below. You can also write your programs on a text editor like Notepad or Textpad and compile them using a compiler like GCC. Some other popular IDEs are Eclipse and Code::Blocks. Turbo C++ is one of the time-tested IDEs that you can use for all C++ programs without any hassles.
Some salient features of C++ are:
1. Object-oriented
2. Simple to code and understand
3. Rich set of libraries
4. Efficient memory management
5. Powerful and fast
How Will C++ Projects Help You?
To practice learning C++, you can do a lot of projects from easy to advanced levels. Each of these projects will teach you something new so that you are familiar with the most important topics that will always come in handy when you build real-world projects.
To work on these projects, you need to install an IDE. You can download a free version of Visual Studio from the Microsoft official website. Or you can download Code::Blocks from their official website.
Top Projects to Enhance Your C++ skills
1. Login and Registration System
This is one of the simplest projects to start with to learn about file systems in C++. The project involves a user registration process by asking username and password. Upon successful registration, a user file is created with the credentials. If the user does not exist, upon login, an error will be shown. You will also learn how to use Visual Studio to create a simple project.
This is a trendy project and very useful for learning about keyboard events, date-time functions, and implementing a C++ login system. The program has separate menus for admin and other users. There are also methods to calculate fare based on time and distance, including displaying car details, availability, etc.
You can try other projects like music store management, bus reservation, or railway reservation system on the same lines as above.
3. Bookshop inventory system
This is a simple project where the system maintains the inventory of books in a bookshop. If a customer purchases a book, the book's count will decrease; if a book is added, the same is updated. Notice the use of pointers. You can modify the code to add a book ID and make the search based on book ID or make the search using just one parameter giving multiple results, and so on.
4. Student Report Management System
Through this project, we can learn a lot about input/output streams and the file management system of C++. Our program collects student details like name, roll number, marks in each subject, and calculates their grade. This is a simple console app. Note that we focus only on the correct inputs in this project, and you can enhance it to handle wrong inputs. Here is the source code:
5. Casino Number Guessing Game
This is an exciting project, where we will learn about the library used for random numbers: cstdlib. The program asks for a betting amount and then asks the user to guess a number on rolling. If the random number generated matches the user input, he wins, else money is deducted. The user can keep playing until he loses all the amount he put in initially. Here is the source code:
6. Sudoku Game
We all know about the popular Sudoku game, wherein we need to arrange numbers from 1-9 such that they appear only once in a row and column of a 9x9 grid. The program uses the concept of backtracking. In this program, we have hard-coded the initial values, but you can also get the same input from the user (though that will be cumbersome for this program). The main thing to understand is the backtracking to find rows and columns that are not assigned any values (are zero). Have a look at the program, execute, and see the results:
7. Credit Card Validator
This is a simple project that uses Luhn’s algorithm to validate a user's credit card. The program works for all popular cards like Visa, Amex, MasterCard, etc. Luhn’s algorithm checks for basic validations; for example, a Visa card should start with 4 and then moves on to complex digit-wise calculations. It is a good program to learn because most e-commerce transactions require credit card validation.
8. Helicopter Game
For all the 90s kids, this was one of the most favorite games and very easy to implement! In this project, we will use SDL graphics. The game is to move the helicopter forward without touching the obstacles. The player should control the game through keys, and holding the key moves the helicopter, and releasing it will bring the helicopter down.
9. Using Graphics to Draw and Move Shapes
In this graphics program, you will learn to make a car and then make it move using graphics. This is a simple program written using Turbo C++; however, the same program will work on other IDEs like Dev C++. Code:: Blocks and Visual Studios. You have to get the graphics.h file for the program to work.
10. Simple Animation to Race a Drunk Man from Start to Finish
This is an interactive console animation app, where your choice of character (any letter from a to z) will appear to move funnily from start to finish line. If he finishes the race within the specified counter (in our case, 1000000), then we print a particular message, else another message.