For other uses, see Limit § Mathematics.

In mathematics, a limit is the value that a function (or sequence) approaches as

the argument (or index) approaches some value.[1] Limits of functions are essential
to calculus and mathematical analysis, and are used to define continuity,
derivatives, and integrals. The concept of a limit of a sequence is further
generalized to the concept of a limit of a topological net, and is closely related
to limit and direct limit in category theory. The limit inferior and limit superior
provide generalizations of the concept of a limit which are particularly relevant
when the limit at a point may not exist.

Notation
In formulas, a limit of a function is usually written as

lim
x
→
c
f
(
x
)
=
L
,
{\displaystyle \lim _{x\to c}f(x)=L,}
and is read as "the limit of f of x as x approaches c equals L". This means that
the value of the function f can be made arbitrarily close to L, by choosing x
sufficiently close to c. Alternatively, the fact that a function f approaches the
limit L as x approaches c is sometimes denoted by a right arrow (→ or
→
{\displaystyle \rightarrow }), as in

f
(
x
)
→
L
as
x
→
c
,
{\displaystyle f(x)\to L{\text{ as }}x\to c,}
which reads "
f
{\displaystyle f} of
x
{\displaystyle x} tends to
L
{\displaystyle L} as
x
{\displaystyle x} tends to
c
{\displaystyle c}".

History
According to Hankel (1871), the modern concept of limit originates from Proposition
X.1 of Euclid's Elements, which forms the basis of the Method of exhaustion found
in Euclid and Archimedes: "Two unequal magnitudes being set out, if from the
greater there is subtracted a magnitude greater than its half, and from that which
is left a magnitude greater than its half, and if this process is repeated
continually, then there will be left some magnitude less than the lesser magnitude
set out."[2][3]

Grégoire de Saint-Vincent gave the first definition of limit (terminus) of a

geometric series in his work Opus Geometricum (1647): "The terminus of a
progression is the end of the series, which none progression can reach, even not if
she is continued in infinity, but which she can approach nearer than a given
segment."[4]

The modern definition of a limit goes back to Bernard Bolzano who, in 1817,
developed the basics of the epsilon-delta technique to define continuous functions.
However, his work remained unknown to other mathematicians until thirty years after
his death.[5]

Augustin-Louis Cauchy in 1821,[6] followed by Karl Weierstrass, formalized the

definition of the limit of a function which became known as the (ε, δ)-definition
of limit.

The modern notation of placing the arrow below the limit symbol is due to G. H.
Hardy, who introduced it in his book A Course of Pure Mathematics in 1908.[7]

Types of limits
In sequences
Main article: Limit of a sequence
Real numbers
The expression 0.999... should be interpreted as the limit of the sequence 0.9,
0.99, 0.999, ... and so on. This sequence can be rigorously shown to have the limit
1, and therefore this expression is meaningfully interpreted as having the value 1.
[8]

Formally, suppose a1, a2, ... is a sequence of real numbers. When the limit of the
sequence exists, the real number L is the limit of this sequence if and only if for
every real number ε > 0, there exists a natural number N such that for all n > N,
we have |an − L| < ε.[9] The common notation
lim
n
→
∞
a
n
=
L
{\displaystyle \lim _{n\to \infty }a_{n}=L}is read as:

"The limit of an as n approaches infinity equals L" or "The limit as n approaches

infinity of an equals L".
The formal definition intuitively means that eventually, all elements of the
sequence get arbitrarily close to the limit, since the absolute value |an − L| is
the distance between an and L.

Not every sequence has a limit. A sequence with a limit is called convergent;
otherwise it is called divergent. One can show that a convergent sequence has only
one limit.

The limit of a sequence and the limit of a function are closely related. On one
hand, the limit as n approaches infinity of a sequence {an} is simply the limit at
infinity of a function a(n)—defined on the natural numbers {n}. On the other hand,
if X is the domain of a function f(x) and if the limit as n approaches infinity of
f(xn) is L for every arbitrary sequence of points {xn} in X − x0 which converges to
x0, then the limit of the function f(x) as x approaches x0 is equal to L.[10] One
such sequence would be {x0 + 1/n}.

Infinity as a limit
There is also a notion of having a limit "tend to infinity", rather than to a
finite value
L
{\displaystyle L}. A sequence
{
a
n
}
{\displaystyle \{a_{n}\}} is said to "tend to infinity" if, for each real number
M
>
0
{\displaystyle M>0}, known as the bound, there exists an integer
N
{\displaystyle N} such that for each
n
>
N
{\displaystyle n>N},
a
n
>
M
.
{\displaystyle a_{n}>M.}That is, for every possible bound, the sequence eventually
exceeds the bound. This is often written
lim
n
→
∞
a
n
=
∞
{\displaystyle \lim _{n\rightarrow \infty }a_{n}=\infty } or simply
a
n
→
∞
{\displaystyle a_{n}\rightarrow \infty }.

It is possible for a sequence to be divergent, but not tend to infinity. Such

sequences are called oscillatory. An example of an oscillatory sequence is
a
n
=
(
−
1
)
n
{\displaystyle a_{n}=(-1)^{n}}.
There is a corresponding notion of tending to negative infinity,
lim
n
→
∞
a
n
=
−
∞
{\displaystyle \lim _{n\rightarrow \infty }a_{n}=-\infty }, defined by changing the
inequality in the above definition to
a
n
<
M
,
{\displaystyle a_{n}<M,} with
M
<
0.
{\displaystyle M<0.}

A sequence
{
a
n
}
{\displaystyle \{a_{n}\}} with
lim
n
→
∞
|
a
n
|
=
∞
{\displaystyle \lim _{n\rightarrow \infty }|a_{n}|=\infty } is called unbounded, a
definition equally valid for sequences in the complex numbers, or in any metric
space. Sequences which do not tend to infinity are called bounded. Sequences which
do not tend to positive infinity are called bounded above, while those which do not
tend to negative infinity are bounded below.

Metric space
The discussion of sequences above is for sequences of real numbers. The notion of
limits can be defined for sequences valued in more abstract spaces, such as metric
spaces. If
M
{\displaystyle M} is a metric space with distance function
d
{\displaystyle d}, and
{
a
n
}
n
≥
0
{\displaystyle \{a_{n}\}_{n\geq 0}} is a sequence in
M
{\displaystyle M}, then the limit (when it exists) of the sequence is an element
a
∈
M
{\displaystyle a\in M} such that, given
ϵ
>
0
{\displaystyle \epsilon >0}, there exists an
N
{\displaystyle N} such that for each
n
>
N
{\displaystyle n>N}, we have
d
(
a
,
a
n
)
<
ϵ
.
{\displaystyle d(a,a_{n})<\epsilon .}An equivalent statement is that
a
n
→
a
{\displaystyle a_{n}\rightarrow a} if the sequence of real numbers
d
(
a
,
a
n
)
→
0
{\displaystyle d(a,a_{n})\rightarrow 0}.

Example: Rn
An important example is the space of
n
{\displaystyle n}-dimensional real vectors, with elements
x
=
(
x
1
,
⋯
,
x
n
)
{\displaystyle \mathbf {x} =(x_{1},\cdots ,x_{n})} where each of the
x
i
{\displaystyle x_{i}} are real, an example of a suitable distance function is the
Euclidean distance, defined by
d
(
x
,
y
)
=
‖
x
−
y
‖
=
∑
i
(
x
i
−
y
i
)
2
.
{\displaystyle d(\mathbf {x} ,\mathbf {y} )=\|\mathbf {x} -\mathbf {y} \|={\sqrt {\
sum _{i}(x_{i}-y_{i})^{2}}}.}The sequence of points
{
x
n
}
n
≥
0
{\displaystyle \{\mathbf {x} _{n}\}_{n\geq 0}} converges to
x
{\displaystyle \mathbf {x} } if the limit exists and
‖
x
n
−
x
‖
→
0
{\displaystyle \|\mathbf {x} _{n}-\mathbf {x} \|\rightarrow 0}.

Topological space
In some sense the most abstract space in which limits can be defined are
topological spaces. If
X
{\displaystyle X} is a topological space with topology
τ
{\displaystyle \tau }, and
{
a
n
}
n
≥
0
{\displaystyle \{a_{n}\}_{n\geq 0}} is a sequence in
X
{\displaystyle X}, then the limit (when it exists) of the sequence is a point
a
∈
X
{\displaystyle a\in X} such that, given a (open) neighborhood
U
∈
τ
{\displaystyle U\in \tau } of
a
{\displaystyle a}, there exists an
N
{\displaystyle N} such that for every
n
>
N
{\displaystyle n>N},
a
n
∈
U
{\displaystyle a_{n}\in U}is satisfied. In this case, the limit (if it exists) may
not be unique. However it must be unique if
X
{\displaystyle X} is a Hausdorff space.

Function space
This section deals with the idea of limits of sequences of functions, not to be
confused with the idea of limits of functions, discussed below.

The field of functional analysis partly seeks to identify useful notions of

convergence on function spaces. For example, consider the space of functions from a
generic set
E
{\displaystyle E} to
R
{\displaystyle \mathbb {R} }. Given a sequence of functions
{
f
n
}
n
>
0
{\displaystyle \{f_{n}\}_{n>0}} such that each is a function
f
n
:
E
→
R
{\displaystyle f_{n}:E\rightarrow \mathbb {R} }, suppose that there exists a
function such that for each
x
∈
E
{\displaystyle x\in E},
f
n
(
x
)
→
f
(
x
)
or equivalently
lim
n
→
∞
f
n
(
x
)
=
f
(
x
)
.
{\displaystyle f_{n}(x)\rightarrow f(x){\text{ or equivalently }}\lim _{n\
rightarrow \infty }f_{n}(x)=f(x).}

Then the sequence

f
n
{\displaystyle f_{n}} is said to converge pointwise to
f
{\displaystyle f}. However, such sequences can exhibit unexpected behavior. For
example, it is possible to construct a sequence of continuous functions which has a
discontinuous pointwise limit.

Another notion of convergence is uniform convergence. The uniform distance between

two functions
f
,
g
:
E
→
R
{\displaystyle f,g:E\rightarrow \mathbb {R} } is the maximum difference between the
two functions as the argument
x
∈
E
{\displaystyle x\in E} is varied. That is,
d
(
f
,
g
)
=
max
x
∈
E
|
f
(
x
)
−
g
(
x
)
|
.
{\displaystyle d(f,g)=\max _{x\in E}|f(x)-g(x)|.}Then the sequence
f
n
{\displaystyle f_{n}} is said to uniformly converge or have a uniform limit of
f
{\displaystyle f} if
f
n
→
f
{\displaystyle f_{n}\rightarrow f} with respect to this distance. The uniform limit
has "nicer" properties than the pointwise limit. For example, the uniform limit of
a sequence of continuous functions is continuous.

Many different notions of convergence can be defined on function spaces. This is

sometimes dependent on the regularity of the space. Prominent examples of function
spaces with some notion of convergence are Lp spaces and Sobolev space.