Question

I was wondering is it safe to do so?

wchar_t wide = /* something */;
assert(wide >= 0 && wide < 256 &&);
char myChar = static_cast<char>(wide);

If I am pretty sure the wide char will fall within ASCII range.

Answer 1

assert is for ensuring that something is true in a debug mode, without it having any effect in a release build. Better to use an if statement and have an alternate plan for characters that are outside the range, unless the only way to get characters outside the range is through a program bug.

Also, depending on your character encoding, you might find a difference between the Unicode characters 0x80 through 0xff and their char version.