The JavaScript Array
object is a global object that is used in the construction of arrays; which are high-level, list-like objects.
Create an Array
var fruits = ["Apple", "Banana"]; console.log(fruits.length); // 2
Access (index into) an Array item
var first = fruits[0]; // Apple var last = fruits[fruits.length - 1]; // Banana
Loop over an Array
fruits.forEach(function (item, index, array) { console.log(item, index); }); // Apple 0 // Banana 1
Add to the end of an Array
var newLength = fruits.push("Orange"); // ["Apple", "Banana", "Orange"]
Remove from the end of an Array
var last = fruits.pop(); // remove Orange (from the end) // ["Apple", "Banana"];
Remove from the front of an Array
var first = fruits.shift(); // remove Apple from the front // ["Banana"];
Add to the front of an Array
var newLength = fruits.unshift("Strawberry") // add to the front // ["Strawberry", "Banana"];
Find the index of an item in the Array
fruits.push("Mango"); // ["Strawberry", "Banana", "Mango"] var pos = fruits.indexOf("Banana"); // 1
Remove an item by Index Position
var removedItem = fruits.splice(pos, 1); // this is how to remove an item // ["Strawberry", "Mango"]
Copy an Array
var shallowCopy = fruits.slice(); // this is how to make a copy // ["Strawberry", "Mango"]
[element0, element1, ..., elementN]
new Array(element0, element1[, ...[, elementN]])
new Array(arrayLength)
elementN
Array
constructor and that argument is a number. (See below.) Note that this special case only applies to JavaScript arrays created with the Array
constructor, not array literals created with the bracket syntax.arrayLength
Array
constructor is an integer between 0 and 232-1 (inclusive), this returns a new JavaScript array with length set to that number. If the argument is any other number, a RangeError exception is thrown.Arrays are list-like objects whose prototype has methods to perform traversal and mutation operations. Neither the length of a JavaScript array nor the types of its elements are fixed. Since an array's size length grow or shrink at any time, JavaScript arrays are not guaranteed to be dense. In general, these are convenient characteristics; but if these features are not desirable for your particular use, you might consider using typed arrays.
Some people think that you shouldn't use an array as an associative array. In any case, you can use plain objects instead, although doing so comes with its own caveats. See the post Lightweight JavaScript dictionaries with arbitrary keys as an example.
JavaScript arrays are zero-indexed: the first element of an array is at index 0
, and the last element is at the index equal to the value of the array's length property minus 1.
var arr = ['this is the first element', 'this is the second element']; console.log(arr[0]); // logs 'this is the first element' console.log(arr[1]); // logs 'this is the second element' console.log(arr[arr.length - 1]); // logs 'this is the second element'
Array elements are object properties in the same way that toString
is a property, but trying to access an element of an array as follows throws a syntax error, because the property name is not valid:
console.log(arr.0); // a syntax error
There is nothing special about JavaScript arrays and the properties that cause this. JavaScript properties that begin with a digit cannot be referenced with dot notation; and must be accessed using bracket notation. For example, if you had an object with a property named '3d'
, it can only be referenced using bracket notation. E.g.:
var years = [1950, 1960, 1970, 1980, 1990, 2000, 2010]; console.log(years.0); // a syntax error console.log(years[0]); // works properly
renderer.3d.setTexture(model, 'character.png'); // a syntax error renderer['3d'].setTexture(model, 'character.png'); // works properly
Note that in the 3d
example, '3d'
had to be quoted. It's possible to quote the JavaScript array indexes as well (e.g., years['2']
instead of years[2]
), although it's not necessary. The 2 in years[2]
is coerced into a string by the JavaScript engine through an implicit toString
conversion. It is for this reason that '2'
and '02'
would refer to two different slots on the years
object and the following example could be true
:
console.log(years['2'] != years['02']);
Similarly, object properties which happen to be reserved words(!) can only be accessed as string literals in bracket notation(but it can be accessed by dot notation in firefox 40.0a2 at least):
var promise = { 'var' : 'text', 'array': [1, 2, 3, 4] }; console.log(promise['array']);
length
and numerical propertiesA JavaScript array's length property and numerical properties are connected. Several of the built-in array methods (e.g., join, slice, indexOf, etc.) take into account the value of an array's length property when they're called. Other methods (e.g., push, splice, etc.) also result in updates to an array's length property.
var fruits = []; fruits.push('banana', 'apple', 'peach'); console.log(fruits.length); // 3
When setting a property on a JavaScript array when the property is a valid array index and that index is outside the current bounds of the array, the engine will update the array's length property accordingly:
fruits[5] = 'mango'; console.log(fruits[5]); // 'mango' console.log(Object.keys(fruits)); // ['0', '1', '2', '5'] console.log(fruits.length); // 6
Increasing the length.
fruits.length = 10; console.log(Object.keys(fruits)); // ['0', '1', '2', '5'] console.log(fruits.length); // 10
Decreasing the length property does, however, delete elements.
fruits.length = 2; console.log(Object.keys(fruits)); // ['0', '1'] console.log(fruits.length); // 2
This is explained further on the Array.length page.
The result of a match between a regular expression and a string can create a JavaScript array. This array has properties and elements which provide information about the match. Such an array is returned by RegExp.exec, String.match, and String.replace. To help explain these properties and elements, look at the following example and then refer to the table below:
// Match one d followed by one or more b's followed by one d // Remember matched b's and the following d // Ignore case var myRe = /d(b+)(d)/i; var myArray = myRe.exec('cdbBdbsbz');
The properties and elements returned from this match are as follows:
Property/Element | Description | Example |
input |
A read-only property that reflects the original string against which the regular expression was matched. | cdbBdbsbz |
index |
A read-only property that is the zero-based index of the match in the string. | 1 |
[0] |
A read-only element that specifies the last matched characters. | dbBd |
[1], ...[n] |
Read-only elements that specify the parenthesized substring matches, if included in the regular expression. The number of possible parenthesized substrings is unlimited. | [1]: bB [2]: d |
Array.length
Array
constructor's length property whose value is 1.Array
instancesAll Array
instances inherit from Array.prototype. The prototype object of the Array
constructor can be modified to affect all Array
instances.
Array
generic methodsArray generics are non-standard, deprecated and will get removed near future. Note that you can not rely on them cross-browser. However, there is a shim available on GitHub.
Sometimes you would like to apply array methods to strings or other array-like objects (such as function arguments). By doing this, you treat a string as an array of characters (or otherwise treat a non-array as an array). For example, in order to check that every character in the variable str is a letter, you would write:
function isLetter(character) { return character >= 'a' && character <= 'z'; } if (Array.prototype.every.call(str, isLetter)) { console.log("The string '" + str + "' contains only letters!"); }
This notation is rather wasteful and JavaScript 1.6 introduced a generic shorthand:
if (Array.every(str, isLetter)) { console.log("The string '" + str + "' contains only letters!"); }
Generics are also available on String.
These are not part of ECMAScript standards (though the ES6 Array.from() can be used to achieve this). The following is a shim to allow its use in all browsers:
// Assumes Array extras already present (one may use polyfills for these as well) (function() { 'use strict'; var i, // We could also build the array of methods with the following, but the // getOwnPropertyNames() method is non-shimable: // Object.getOwnPropertyNames(Array).filter(function(methodName) { // return typeof Array[methodName] === 'function' // }); methods = [ 'join', 'reverse', 'sort', 'push', 'pop', 'shift', 'unshift', 'splice', 'concat', 'slice', 'indexOf', 'lastIndexOf', 'forEach', 'map', 'reduce', 'reduceRight', 'filter', 'some', 'every', 'find', 'findIndex', 'entries', 'keys', 'values', 'copyWithin', 'includes' ], methodCount = methods.length, assignArrayGeneric = function(methodName) { if (!Array[methodName]) { var method = Array.prototype[methodName]; if (typeof method === 'function') { Array[methodName] = function() { return method.call.apply(method, arguments); }; } } }; for (i = 0; i < methodCount; i++) { assignArrayGeneric(methods[i]); } }());
The following example creates an array, msgArray
, with a length of 0, then assigns values to msgArray[0]
and msgArray[99]
, changing the length of the array to 100.
var msgArray = []; msgArray[0] = 'Hello'; msgArray[99] = 'world'; if (msgArray.length === 100) { console.log('The length is 100.'); }
The following creates a chess board as a two dimensional array of strings. The first move is made by copying the 'p' in (6,4) to (4,4). The old position (6,4) is made blank.
var board = [ ['R','N','B','Q','K','B','N','R'], ['P','P','P','P','P','P','P','P'], [' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' '], [' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' '], [' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' '], [' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' ',' '], ['p','p','p','p','p','p','p','p'], ['r','n','b','q','k','b','n','r'] ]; console.log(board.join('\n') + '\n\n'); // Move King's Pawn forward 2 board[4][4] = board[6][4]; board[6][4] = ' '; console.log(board.join('\n'));
Here is the output:
R,N,B,Q,K,B,N,R P,P,P,P,P,P,P,P , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , p,p,p,p,p,p,p,p r,n,b,q,k,b,n,r R,N,B,Q,K,B,N,R P,P,P,P,P,P,P,P , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,p, , , , , , , , , , p,p,p,p, ,p,p,p r,n,b,q,k,b,n,r
Created by Mozilla Contributors and licensed under CC-BY-SA 2.5