How to check if a number is a power of 2

Question

Today I needed a simple algorithm for checking if a number is a power of 2.

The algorithm needs to be:

1. Simple
2. Correct for any ulong

Answer 1

Mark gravell suggested this if you have .NET Core 3, System.Runtime.Intrinsics.X86.Popcnt.PopCount

public bool IsPowerOfTwo(uint i)
{
    return Popcnt.PopCount(i) == 1
}

Single instruction, faster than (x != 0) && ((x & (x - 1)) == 0) but less portable.