Finding maximum (max) text-item in a list using python -

why max function operates differently in 2 list below:

>>> list1=['the school','boy', 'the wise old man'] >>> max(list1) 'the wise old man'  list2=['made', 'with', 'then', 'happy home', 'came', 'this', 'them', 'from', 'have', 'into'] >>> max(list2) 'with' 

obviously in list2, 'happy home'is supposed 'max' has more number of text others in list.

any ideas why? thanks.

max() compares strings lexicographically; found element sorted last. thus, 'the wise old man' comes after the school, alphabetically speaking.

to longest string instead, pass function key argument of max():

max(list2, key=len) 

generally speaking, without key function, max() find value value > othervalue true other values in input sequence.

the key argument, if provided, gives max() different value compare decide item in sequence largest.