[heywhatupboys]

That has nothing to do with the C memory model, but how the CPU is structured. No modern CPU has an interface for bit-address accessing as far as I am aware...

C makes no assumptions about the size of a byte

[Kamq]

C doesn't really know about bytes. It has chars, but I believe there are some constraints on char, specifically, they have to be big enough to hold the ASCII charset. (I'm pulling real deep here, someone correct me if I'm wrong)

[nitrix]

C11 3.6p1 byte "addressable unit of data storage large enough to hold any member of the basic character set of the execution environment"

[messe]

If I remember correctly, it assumes the size of a char is greater than or equal to seven bits, and a char is defined to be the smallest addressable unit.

C does not support bit-addressing.

[nitrix]

The width is defined as CHAR_BIT >= 8 (C11 5.2.4.2.1p1). The size, sizeof (char), is always 1.