Benchmark: callbacks vs promises vs async/awaits

Tests:

callbacks
((cb) => {cb()})(() => {});
promises
(()=>Promise.resolve())();
async/awaits
(async() => { await true; })();

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
callbacks
promises
async/awaits

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: 8 days 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
callbacks	184731360.0 Ops/sec
promises	84082680.0 Ops/sec
async/awaits	6513891.0 Ops/sec

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated 2 months ago):

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

Let's break down what's being tested in this benchmark.

**What's being compared:**

The benchmark is comparing three different approaches to handling asynchronous operations:

1. **Callbacks**: This approach uses a callback function to execute another function after some operation is complete. In the benchmark, `((cb) => {cb()})(() => {})` defines a callback function that immediately calls itself.
2. **Promises**: This approach uses promises to handle asynchronous operations. A promise is an object that represents a value that may not be available yet, but will be eventually.
3. **Async/Awaits**: This approach uses the `async` and `await` keywords to wait for the completion of an asynchronous operation.

**Pros and Cons:**

1. **Callbacks**:
	* Pros: Simple, lightweight, and widely supported.
	* Cons: Can lead to callback hell (nested callbacks), making code harder to read and maintain.
2. **Promises**:
	* Pros: More readable than callbacks, supports chaining, and can be used with async/await.
	* Cons: Can be less efficient due to the overhead of promise creation and manipulation.
3. **Async/Awaits**:
	* Pros: Modern, concise, and easy to read. Allows for simpler code compared to promises.
	* Cons: Requires modern browsers or Node.js versions, which may not be compatible with older systems.

**Library:**

None explicitly mentioned in the benchmark definition, but `Promise` is a built-in JavaScript object used in the promise approach.

**Special JS feature/syntax:**

The async/await syntax requires support for modern browsers (including Firefox 129) or Node.js versions. The promises and callbacks approaches are more widely supported, but async/await is often considered more readable and concise.

**Other alternatives:**

1. **Functions with a `then` method**: Instead of using a promise, you can use a callback function inside another function.
2. **Generators**: Can be used for asynchronous operations, providing an alternative to promises.
3. **Async/await with a polyfill**: If the browser or environment doesn't support async/await natively, you can use a polyfill to add support.

Keep in mind that this benchmark focuses on comparing three specific approaches and might not cover all possible alternatives or edge cases.

Related benchmarks:

callbacks vs promises vs async/awaits (version: 0)

Comparing performance of: callbacks vs promises vs async/awaits

Created: one year ago by: Guest

Jump to the latest result

callbacks

promises

async/awaits

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Experimental features:

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Autogenerated LLM Summary (model llama3.2:3b, generated 2 months ago):