Benchmark: new Url vs test RegEx speed

Tests:

new URL
return new URL('https://is5-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Purple126/v4/00/33/2e/00332e58-b196-82cf-1231-82d81d6fe477/AppIcon_TikTok-0-0-1x_U007emarketing-0-0-0-7-0-0-sRGB-0-0-0-GLES2_U002c0-512MB-85-220-0-0.png/512x0w.png');
RegEx
return /((http|ftp|https):\/\/)?(([\w.-]*)\.([\w]*))/.test('https://is5-ssl.mzstatic.com/image/thumb/Purple126/v4/00/33/2e/00332e58-b196-82cf-1231-82d81d6fe477/AppIcon_TikTok-0-0-1x_U007emarketing-0-0-0-7-0-0-sRGB-0-0-0-GLES2_U002c0-512MB-85-220-0-0.png/512x0w.png')

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
new URL
RegEx

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: one month ago)

User agent: Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/131.0.0.0 Safari/537.36

Browser/OS: Chrome 131 on Mac OS X 10.15.7

View result in a separate tab

Test name	Executions per second
new URL	2979581.0 Ops/sec
RegEx	31432600.0 Ops/sec

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

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

The benchmark you provided compares two different methods for parsing and testing URLs in JavaScript: creating a new URL object using the `new URL()` constructor and using a Regular Expression (RegEx) to validate the URL format.

### Options Being Compared

1. **`new URL()` Constructor**
   - **Test Case:** `return new URL('https://...');`
   - **Purpose:** The `new URL()` constructor is part of the standard JavaScript API designed to parse a string as a URL and return a URL object. This object provides properties and methods to access different components of the URL, such as protocol, hostname, pathname, etc.
   
2. **Regular Expression Testing**
   - **Test Case:** `return /((http|ftp|https):\/\/)?(([\\w.-]*)\\.([\\w]*))/.test('https://...');`
   - **Purpose:** This approach utilizes a Regular Expression to check if a given string matches the URL pattern specified in the regex. If it matches, it indicates that the string has the format of a URL.

### Pros and Cons of Different Approaches

#### `new URL()`
- **Pros:**
  - **Built-in Handling:** Automatically handles various URL components (like query strings and hash fragments) efficiently and accurately.
  - **Simplicity:** Easy to use and understand, especially for developers familiar with object-oriented programming.
  - **Robustness:** Provides built-in error handling; if the URL is invalid, it throws an error.
  
- **Cons:**
  - **Performance:** Creating a new URL object can be more resource-intensive compared to simple RegEx matching, particularly in scenarios with high volumes of URLs that need validation without further inspection.
  - **Browser Compatibility:** While widely supported, older browsers may not fully support the `URL` API.

#### Regular Expressions
- **Pros:**
  - **Performance:** Tends to be faster for simple format validation, as it avoids the overhead of creating an object.
  - **Flexibility:** Very customizable; developers can modify the regex to cater to specific URL formats or conditions.
  
- **Cons:**
  - **Complexity:** Writing and maintaining regex can be complex and error-prone, especially for complex URL patterns.
  - **Limitations:** Does not parse the URL into its components; it only checks for a match against the pattern. Handling of invalid URLs would need to be conducted explicitly.
  - **Potential for Incomplete Validation:** Simple regex patterns may allow for invalid URLs to pass through if not carefully defined.

### Other Considerations
- **Use Case:** The choice between these two methods should be informed by the specific use case. If parsing entire URLs and accessing parts are necessary, `new URL()` is preferable. Conversely, if simple validation is all that's needed, regex may suffice.
  
### Alternatives
- **Third-party Libraries:** Libraries like `validator.js` or `url-parse` offer more comprehensive validation or parsing utilities that can include more features and edge cases than what JavaScript built-in methods offer.
- **Custom Parsing Functions:** If performance is a critical concern, developers can also implement lightweight, custom URL validation logic tailored to their specific requirements, balancing performance and correctness.

In summary, the benchmark is testing two popular methods of URL parsing and validation in JavaScript, presenting their advantages and limitations. The results indicate that the regex approach provides significantly higher execution speeds compared to the `new URL()` constructor under these test conditions, which might suggest its suitability for high-performance scenarios.

Related benchmarks:

new Url vs test RegEx speed (version: 1)

Comparing performance of: new URL vs RegEx

Created: one month ago by: Guest

Jump to the latest result

new URL

RegEx

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Experimental features:

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

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