---
title: base
framework: swift
role: symbol
role_heading: Instance Property
path: swift/slice/base
---

# base

The underlying collection of the slice.

## Declaration

```swift
var base: Base { get }
```

## Discussion

Discussion You can use a slice’s base property to access its base collection. The following example declares singleDigits, a range of single digit integers, and then drops the first element to create a slice of that range, singleNonZeroDigits. The base property of the slice is equal to singleDigits. let singleDigits = 0..<10 let singleNonZeroDigits = singleDigits.dropFirst() // singleNonZeroDigits is a Slice<Range<Int>>

print(singleNonZeroDigits.count) // Prints "9" print(singleNonZeroDigits.base.count) // Prints "10" print(singleDigits == singleNonZeroDigits.base) // Prints "true"