Question: I'm not sure whether it's the same in Python.

Has anyone tried that before?

<http://docs.python.org/library/operator#operator.iadd>

Answer: 
Nope

```
>>> bar = timeit.Timer("a += 1", "a = 0")
>>> bar.timeit(number=1000000)
0.064391136169433594
>>> bar = timeit.Timer("a = a + 1", "a = 0")
>>> bar.timeit(number=1000000)
0.064393997192382812
>>>

```
Yep, but the difference is marginal.

```
>>> timeit.Timer('x += 1', 'x = 0').timeit(10**8)
5.7387330532073975
>>> timeit.Timer('x = x + 1', 'x = 0').timeit(10**8)
6.04801607131958
>>> timeit.Timer('x += 1', 'x = 0').timeit(10**8)
5.790481090545654
>>> timeit.Timer('x = x + 1', 'x = 0').timeit(10**8)
6.083467960357666

```