1 Injectivity, Surjectivity, Bijectivity

Introduction

Having seen that some functions are left-, right-, and two-sided invertible, our
goal is to characterize the properties of functions which allow us to conduct these
inversions.

Learning Objectives
• Define injective, surjective, and bijective functions. Provide plain
English explanations describing the characteristics of such functions.
• Be able to identify and prove whether a function is injective, surjec-
tive, or bijective.
• Prove simple results about injective, surjective, and bijective func-
tions.
• Describe the relationships between injective, surjective, and bijective
functions and invertibility. Prove that relationship.

Injective and Surjective Functions

Definition 1
A function f : S → T is said to be injective or one-to-one if whenever
f (s1 ) = f (s2 ) then s1 = s2 .

The output of an injective function uniquely corresponds to the input; that

is, the only way for two outputs to be equal (f (s1 ) = f (s2 )) is for the inputs to
have also been equal (s1 = s2 ). The is also alluded to in the phrase one-to-one. If
we view a function as a collection of arrows as in Figure 1, a function is injective
if every element of the codomain has at most one arrow pointing to it.

f :X→Y

a δ

β
b
ϵ
c
α
d γ

X Y
Figure 1: If f : X → Y is an injective function, each element of the codomain Y
has at most one arrow pointing at it.
Injectivity, Surjectivity, Bijectivity 2

Example 2

Determine whether each of the following functions is injective.

1. f : Z5 → Z5 , n 7→ n3
2. g : P(N) → N which maps S ⊆ N to its minimal element.
3. h : (0, ∞) → R, x 7→ x2 .

Solution.
1. The easiest way to do this is to just check the output of f on every entry
of Z5 , from which we find that

f (0) = 0, f (1) = 1, f (2) = 3, f (3) = 2, f (4) = 4.

Indeed, since the output of f is unique in each case, f is injective.

2. This function is not injective, and to show it we need only provide a coun-
terexample. Indeed, let S1 = {1} and S2 = {1, 2}, for which we get
g(S1 ) = 1 = g(S2 ) despite the fact that S1 ̸= S2 .
3. This function is injective. Suppose that x1 , x2 ∈ (0, ∞) are such that
f (x1 ) = f (x2 ); that is, x21 = x22 . Solving this equation gives x1 = ±x2 ;
however, since both numbers have to be positive, we conclude that x1 = x2 ,
showing injectivity as required. ■

Proposition 3

If f : B → C and g : A → B are injective functions, then h = f ◦g : A → C

is also injective.

Solution. Assume that h(x) = h(y) for some x, y ∈ A. By definition of h we have

f (g(x)) = f (g(y)). Since the function f is injective, the only way f (m1 ) = f (m2 )
is if m1 = m2 , so f (g(x)) = f (g(y)) implies that g(x) = g(y). Since g is also
injective, it must be the case that x = y. Thus we have shown that if h(x) = h(y)
then x = y, showing that h is injective as required. ■

Exercise 4 Let f : B → C and g : A → B be functions. Show that if f ◦ g

is injective, then g is injective. Must it be true that f is injective as well?

The dual notion to an injective function is a surjective function, and this

duality will be made clearer later.
Definition 5
A function f : S → T is said to be surjective or onto if for every element
t ∈ T , there is an element s ∈ S such that f (s) = t.

When thinking about surjective functions, the idea to keep in mind is that
every element in T is the image of something in S. Put another way, if f maps
3 Injectivity, Surjectivity, Bijectivity

f :X→Y

a
β
b

c
α
d

X Y
Figure 2: If f : X → Y is surjective, then every element of the codomain has at
least one arrow pointing at it.

elements of S to elements of T , everything in T is hit by something in S. If we

describe a function as arrows between sets, a function f is surjective if everything
in T has at least one arrow pointing to it.
Example 6

Of the functions defined in Example 2, which are surjective?

Solution.
1. Looking at the values we’ve already computed in Example 2, we can see
that every element of Z5 is the output of f , so f is surjective.
2. The function g is surjective. To show this, let n ∈ N be arbitrary, and
define Sn = {n}. Since g takes each set to its minimal element and Sn
consists of a single element, we get that g(Sn ) = n. Thus every natural
number is the image of some set, showing that g is surjective.
3. This function fails to be surjective since the function h cannot hit any
negative numbers. Indeed, for the sake of contradiction suppose that h is
surjective. Let x ∈ (0, ∞) be such that h(x) = −1. But h(x) = x2 > 0 for
all x ∈ (0, ∞), so 0 > −1 = x2 < 0 is a contradiction. ■

Proposition 7

If f : B → C and g : A → B are surjective functions, then f ◦ g : A → C

is also surjective.

Solution. Let c ∈ C be an arbitrary element, for which we need to find an

a ∈ A such that f (g(a)) = c. Since f is surjective, there exists b ∈ B such that
f (b) = c. Since g is surjective, there exists a ∈ A such that g(a) = b. Now
f (g(a)) = f (b) = c as required. ■
Injectivity, Surjectivity, Bijectivity 4

Exercise 8 Determine if each function below is injective, surjective, both,

or neither.
1. The function f : R → R, x 7→ sin(x).
2. The function d : R → R2 , x 7→ (x, x).
3. The function p : R2 → R, (x, y) 7→ x.
4. Let PolyR be the polynomials with real coefficients, and define ev0 :
PolyR → R as ev0 (p) = p(0).

Exercise 9 Like Exercise 4, there should be a corresponding statement

that goes “If f ◦ g is surjective, then ... ” Determine which of f or g must
be surjective and prove your result.

Definition 10
A function f : S → T is bijective if it is both injective and surjective.

If f : S → T is injective, every element of T has at most one arrow pointing

at it. If f is surjective, then every element of T has at least one arrow pointing
at it. If f is bijective (and hence both injective and surjective), this must mean
that every element of T has exactly one arrow pointing at it. We’ve shown
that compositions of injective/surjective functions are injective/surjective, so it
immediately follows that compositions of bijections are bijections.

Exercise 11 Consider the maps defined in Example 2 and Exercise 8.

Which, if any, of these functions are bijective?

Invertibility, Again

Look back on the left- and right-invertible functions we played with in the last
reading. Can you say anything about their status as injective or surjective func-
tions? Do you think that these concepts might be related?

Proposition 12

If f : S → T is a function with a non-empty domain S, then f is

1. left-invertible if and only if it is injective.
2. right-invertible if and only if it is surjective.
3. invertible if and only if it is bijective.

Proof. We will do the injectivity proof for you, leaving surjectivity and bijectivity
as exercises.
( ⇐= ) Let’s begin by assuming that f : S → T is injective. Define the
5 Injectivity, Surjectivity, Bijectivity

function g : T → S as follows: Let s0 ∈ S be any element and set

(
s if f (s) = t
g(t) = .
s0 otherwise

If you reexamine Figure 1, the idea is to simply reverse each given arrow. How-
ever, anything which does not already have an arrow pointing to it needs to map
somewhere. Hence we choose an arbitrary element s0 in the domain and map all
those points to s0 . To see that g is a left inverse of f , let s ∈ S, in which case
g(f (s)) = s by definition of g.
( =⇒ ) Conversely, assume that f has a left inverse g : T → S so that
g(f (s)) = s for any s ∈ S. Set f (x) = f (y) for which we would like to show that
x = y. By applying g to both sides we get

g(f (x)) = g(f (y)) ⇒ x=y

so that f is injective as required.

Exercise 13 Finish the proof of Proposition 12 by showing that right-

invertibility is equivalent to surjectivity. The bijectivity result will follow
quickly thereafter.

Example 14

Show that the function f : R2 → R4 given by (a, b) 7→ (a + b, a − b, a2 , b2 )

is injective.

Solution. This is a case where demonstrating the injectivity of f is most easily

done by constructing a left-inverse. You are encouraged to try proving injectivity
using the definition! It is possible, just a little long.
We are looking for a function g : R4 → R2 such that g(f (x)) = x for all
x ∈ R2 . Or, if we write x = (a, b) then

(a, b) = g(f (a, b)) = g(a + b, a − b, a2 , b2 ) = g(y1 , y2 , y3 , y4 )

where y1 = a + b, y2 = a − b, y3 = a2 , and y4 = b2 . Note that

y1 + y2 = 2a and y1 − y2 = 2b

so that
y1 + y2 y1 − y2
a= and b = .
2 2
Thus g(y1 , y2 , y3 , y4 ) = ((y1 + y2 )/2), (y1 − y2 )/2) is a left-inverse for f , as you
can check. This shows that f is injective, as required. ■

Exercise 15 Show, using the definition of injectivity, that the function f

from Example 14 is injective.