Benchmark: math.abs - MeasureThat.net

HTML Preparation code:

<!--your preparation HTML code goes here-->

Script Preparation code:

num = -2.2

Tests:

math.abs
Math.abs(num)
ternary logical
num < 0 ? num *= -1 : 0 ;

Historical Performance Data aggregated from 14 community runs

Desktop Results:

Chrome 14 runs

ternary logical

505.5M/s

math.abs

437.2M/s

Fastest: ternary logical (1.2x faster)

View exact numbers

✓ ternary logical: 505,540,864 ops/sec
• math.abs: 437,166,592 ops/sec

Results show median performance across all community submissions. Run this benchmark yourself to verify on your device.

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
math.abs
ternary logical

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: 5 months ago)

User agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/145.0.0.0 Safari/537.36 Edg/145.0.0.0

Browser/OS: Chrome 145 on Windows

View result in a separate tab

math.abs

84.1M/s

ternary logical

68.4M/s

View exact numbers

Test name	Executions per second
✓ math.abs	84,126,896 Ops/sec
ternary logical	68,384,544 Ops/sec

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model gpt-4o-mini, generated one year ago):

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

The provided benchmark tests the performance of two different methods for calculating the absolute value of a number in JavaScript: using the built-in `Math.abs()` function and implementing a ternary operator approach. Here’s a detailed breakdown of the benchmark, the options being compared, their pros and cons, and other relevant considerations.

### Benchmark Overview

1. **Test Name: `math.abs`**
   - **Benchmark Definition:** `Math.abs(num)`
   - **Description:** This method calls the built-in JavaScript function `Math.abs()`, which computes the absolute value of the number `num`.

2. **Test Name: `ternary logical`**
   - **Benchmark Definition:** `num < 0 ? num *= -1 : 0;`
   - **Description:** This method uses a ternary operator (a shorthand for `if-else`) to check if `num` is less than zero. If true, it multiplies `num` by -1 to make it positive; otherwise, it does nothing (returns 0).

### Comparison of Approaches

#### 1. **Using `Math.abs(num)`**
- **Pros:**
  - **Simplicity:** The function is straightforward and designed specifically for this purpose, making the intention of the code clear.
  - **Performance:** Built-in functions in JavaScript are often optimized for performance in the JavaScript engine, typically resulting in better execution times.
  - **Readability:** Using standard library functions improves code maintainability, as other developers will be familiar with them.
  
- **Cons:**
  - **Overhead:** Although negligible in most cases, there might be a slight overhead when calling a function compared to direct arithmetic operations.

#### 2. **Using a Ternary Operator for Absolute Value**
- **Pros:**
  - **Control:** It allows for fine-tuned control over how the absolute value is determined, though for absolute values, this might not be necessary.
  
- **Cons:**
  - **Complexity:** The logic can be less readable, particularly for those unfamiliar with the ternary operator. It's not immediately clear that this is meant to compute the absolute value.
  - **Performance:** This method may be less efficient than calling a well-optimized native function like `Math.abs()`. The use of a ternary operator introduces a conditional check that may incur a performance penalty.
  - **Edge Cases:** The ternary operator returns `0` if the number is non-negative, which may not be the desired outcome; it could be misleading in certain use cases if not carefully considered.

### Benchmark Results

According to the benchmark results:
- `Math.abs(num)` executes at a rate of **364,508,000 executions per second**.
- The ternary operator approach executes at a rate of **86,645,928 executions per second**.

### Conclusions and Considerations

- **Use Cases:** While the ternary operator approach demonstrates how to implement absolute value calculations, it’s generally recommended to use `Math.abs()` in production code for the sake of performance and readability.
- **Alternatives:** Other alternatives for calculating absolute values could include using the `Math.max(num, -num)` strategy, or using the `Math.sign()` function combined with multiplication, but these are also likely to be less efficient than `Math.abs()`.

In summary, for most scenarios, utilizing JavaScript’s built-in `Math.abs()` function is the preferable method due to its performance optimization and simplicity, as demonstrated in this benchmark.

math.abs (version: 1)

checking math

Comparing performance of: `math.abs vs ternary logical`

Created: one year ago by: Guest

Go to the latest result

math.abs

ternary logical

Historical Performance Data aggregated from 14 community runs

Desktop Results:

Chrome 14 runs

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model gpt-4o-mini, generated one year ago):

math.abs (version: 1)

checking math

Comparing performance of: math.abs vs ternary logical

Created: one year ago by: Guest

Go to the latest result

math.abs

ternary logical

Historical Performance Data aggregated from 14 community runs

Desktop Results:

Chrome 14 runs

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model gpt-4o-mini, generated one year ago):

Related benchmarks

Comparing performance of: `math.abs vs ternary logical`