what is a reference in c++? a reference is like a dereferenced pointer, it could be viewed as a constant pointer to a variable where each time we use it is dereferenced. We must bound it to a variable during initialization and cannot reassign it. If we print the address of a reference it returns the same address of the variable who is bounded.
int x = 3; int* ptrx = &x; //pointer to x int& rx = x; //reference to x rx = 3; //equivalent to *ptrx
&x and &rx are the same while a pointer has its own address, can be rebound etc.