**Ruby arrays** are a key foundation of programming in Ruby. They are used frequently, so it is useful to know and understand the most commonly used methods. 

An example of an array is shown below.
```ruby
array = ["a", "b", "c", "d", "e"]
```
**`array.first`** is a property of an array in Ruby that returns the first element of an array. If the array is empty, it returns nil.
`array.first` accesses the first element of the array, i.e., the element at index `0`.

#    
## Syntax
```ruby
array.first
```
## Parameters
`array.first` does not take any parameters.

## Return value
`array.first` returns the first element of an array.

>Note: `array.first` is *not* the same as the `array.first()` function, which returns the first `n` elements of an array.

## Code 
In the example below, we create a simple array and make use of the `.first` property.



# creating arrays
languagesArray = ["Ruby on Rails!", "Java", "C++", "Python", "Javascript" ]
numbersArray = [1, 2, 3, 4, 5]
emptyArray = []

puts "#{languagesArray.first}"
puts "#{numbersArray.first}"
puts "#{emptyArray.first}"    # Prints nil because it is an empty array

In the code above, the `emptyArray.first` value is printed as nothing because does not contain any elements.

What is array.first in Ruby?

Syntax

Parameters

Return value

Code