Differences between pointers and references in C++

It is not necessary to initialize it with a value during declaration.

int a = 5;
int *p;
p = &a;

It can be assigned a NULL value.

It must be dereferenced with a * to access the variable’s value.

Arithmetic operations can be performed on it.

After declaration, it can be re-assigned to any other variable of the same type.

int a = 5;
int *p;
p = &a;
int b = 6;
p = &b;

It is necessary to initialize it with a value during declaration.

int a = 5;
int &ref = a;

It cannot be NULL.

It does not need to be dereferenced and can be used simply by name.

Arithmetic operations can not be performed on it.

It cannot be re-assigned to any other variable after its initialization.