BIT

Basic Info
Addressing Mode	Opcode	Length	Speed
Immediate	89	2/3 bytes	2 cycles*
Absolute	2C	3 bytes	4 cycles*
Direct Page	24	2 bytes	3 cycles*
Absolute Indexed by X	3C	3 bytes	4 cycles*
Direct Page Indexed by X	34	2 bytes	4 cycles*

Flags Affected
Addressing Mode	N	V	M	X	D	I	Z	C
Immediate	.	.	.	.	.	.	Z	.
other	N	V	.	.	.	.	Z	.

BIT is a 65x instruction that performs a logical AND operation between the accumulator and memory without storing the conjunction. If the conjunction is zero, the zero flag is set, otherwise it is cleared.

Except in immediate addressing, the most significant bit of the data located at the effective address is moved into the negative flag, and the second most significant bit of that data is moved into the overflow flag. BIT is often used right before a conditional branch instruction like BVC or BVS.

Syntax

BIT #const
BIT addr
BIT dp
BIT addr, X
BIT dp, X

Cycle Penalties

• BIT takes an extra cycle when the accumulator is 16 bits wide, in all addressing modes
• In direct page addressing modes, BIT takes an extra cycle when the low byte of the direct page register is nonzero
• In Absolute Indexed, X Addressing, BIT takes an extra cycle when adding the index crosses a page boundary

See Also

• AND
• BPL
• BNE
• BCC
• BCS

External Links

• Eyes & Lichty, page 431 on BIT
• Labiak, page 121 on BIT
• MCS6500 Manual page 47 on BIT: https://archive.org/details/mos_microcomputers_programming_manual/page/n62
• Carr, page 249 on BIT
• Leventhal page 3-45 on BIT: https://archive.org/details/6502-assembly-language-programming/page/n94
• snes9x implementation of BIT: https://github.com/snes9xgit/snes9x/blob/master/cpuops.cpp#L265
• undisbeliever on BIT: https://undisbeliever.net/snesdev/65816-opcodes.html#bit-test-memory-bits-against-accumulator
• Pickens, John. http://www.6502.org/tutorials/6502opcodes.html#BIT
• Clark, Bruce. http://www.6502.org/tutorials/65c816opcodes.html#6.1.2.2