Javascript Set vs. Array performance

Question

It maybe because Sets are relatively new to Javascript but I haven't been able to find an article, on StackO or anywhere else, that talks about the performance difference between the two in Javascript. So, what is the difference, in terms of performance, between the two? Specifically, when it comes to removing, adding and iterating.

Answer 1

Ok, I have tested adding, iterating and removing elements from both an array and a set. I ran a "small" test, using 10 000 elements and a "big" test, using 100 000 elements. Here are the results.

Adding elements to a collection

It would seem that the .push array method is about 4 times faster than the .add set method, no matter the number of elements being added.

Iterating over and modifying elements in a collection

For this part of the test I used a for loop to iterate over the array and a for of loop to iterate over the set. Again, iterating over the array was faster. This time it would seem that it is exponentially so as it took twice as long during the "small" tests and almost four times longer during the "big" tests.

Removing elements from a collection

Now this is where it gets interesting. I used a combination of a for loop and .splice to remove some elements from the array and I used for of and .delete to remove some elements from the set. For the "small" tests, it was about three times faster to remove items from the set (2.6 ms vs 7.1 ms) but things changed drastically for the "big" test where it took 1955.1 ms to remove items from the array while it only took 83.6 ms to remove them from the set, 23 times faster.

Conclusions

At 10k elements, both tests ran comparable times (array: 16.6 ms, set: 20.7 ms) but when dealing with 100k elements, the set was the clear winner (array: 1974.8 ms, set: 83.6 ms) but only because of the removing operation. Otherwise the array was faster. I couldn't say exactly why that is.

I played around with some hybrid scenarios where an array was created and populated and then converted into a set where some elements would be removed, the set would then be reconverted into an array. Although doing this will give much better performance than removing elements in the array, the additional processing time needed to transfer to and from a set outweighs the gains of populating an array instead of a set. In the end, it is faster to only deal with a set. Still, it is an interesting idea, that if one chooses to use an array as a data collection for some big data that doesn't have duplicates, it could be advantageous performance wise, if there is ever a need to remove many elements in one operation, to convert the array to a set, perform the removal operation, and convert the set back to an array.

Array code:

var timer = function(name) {
  var start = new Date();
  return {
    stop: function() {
      var end = new Date();
      var time = end.getTime() - start.getTime();
      console.log('Timer:', name, 'finished in', time, 'ms');
    }
  }
};

var getRandom = function(min, max) {
  return Math.random() * (max - min) + min;
};

var lastNames = ['SMITH', 'JOHNSON', 'WILLIAMS', 'JONES', 'BROWN', 'DAVIS', 'MILLER', 'WILSON', 'MOORE', 'TAYLOR', 'ANDERSON', 'THOMAS'];

var genLastName = function() {
  var index = Math.round(getRandom(0, lastNames.length - 1));
  return lastNames[index];
};

var sex = ["Male", "Female"];

var genSex = function() {
  var index = Math.round(getRandom(0, sex.length - 1));
  return sex[index];
};

var Person = function() {
  this.name = genLastName();
  this.age = Math.round(getRandom(0, 100))
  this.sex = "Male"
};

var genPersons = function() {
  for (var i = 0; i < 100000; i++)
    personArray.push(new Person());
};

var changeSex = function() {
  for (var i = 0; i < personArray.length; i++) {
    personArray[i].sex = genSex();
  }
};

var deleteMale = function() {
  for (var i = 0; i < personArray.length; i++) {
    if (personArray[i].sex === "Male") {
      personArray.splice(i, 1)
      i--
    }
  }
};

var t = timer("Array");

var personArray = [];

genPersons();

changeSex();

deleteMale();

t.stop();

console.log("Done! There are " + personArray.length + " persons.")

Set code:

var timer = function(name) {
    var start = new Date();
    return {
        stop: function() {
            var end  = new Date();
            var time = end.getTime() - start.getTime();
            console.log('Timer:', name, 'finished in', time, 'ms');
        }
    }
};

var getRandom = function (min, max) {
  return Math.random() * (max - min) + min;
};

var lastNames = ['SMITH','JOHNSON','WILLIAMS','JONES','BROWN','DAVIS','MILLER','WILSON','MOORE','TAYLOR','ANDERSON','THOMAS'];

var genLastName = function() {
    var index = Math.round(getRandom(0, lastNames.length - 1));
    return lastNames[index];
};

var sex = ["Male", "Female"];

var genSex = function() {
    var index = Math.round(getRandom(0, sex.length - 1));
    return sex[index];
};

var Person = function() {
	this.name = genLastName();
	this.age = Math.round(getRandom(0,100))
	this.sex = "Male"
};

var genPersons = function() {
for (var i = 0; i < 100000; i++)
	personSet.add(new Person());
};

var changeSex = function() {
	for (var key of personSet) {
		key.sex = genSex();
	}
};

var deleteMale = function() {
	for (var key of personSet) {
		if (key.sex === "Male") {
			personSet.delete(key)
		}
	}
};

var t = timer("Set");

var personSet = new Set();

genPersons();

changeSex();

deleteMale();

t.stop();

console.log("Done! There are " + personSet.size + " persons.")