Benchmark: Traverse function vs NodeIterator vs TreeWalker

Script Preparation code:

// language=HTML
const html = `
    <!-- article out start -->
    <article>
        <!-- article in start -->
        <h1>Lorem ipsum</h1>
        <p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Cumque, nostrum.</p>
        <!-- article in end -->
    </article>
    <!-- article out end -->

    <!-- article out start -->
    <article>
        <!-- article in start -->
        <h1>Lorem ipsum</h1>
        <p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Cumque, nostrum.</p>
        <!-- article in end -->
    </article>
    <!-- article out end -->

    <!-- article out start -->
    <article>
        <!-- article in start -->
        <h1>Lorem ipsum</h1>
        <p>Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipisicing elit. Cumque, nostrum.</p>
        <!-- article in end -->
    </article>
    <!-- article out end -->
`;
const template = document.createElement('template');
template.innerHTML = html;

window.testTemplate = template;

window.testTraverse = function traverse(node, use) {
    if (!node) return;

    use(node);
    traverse(node.firstChild, use);
    traverse(node.nextSibling, use);
}

Tests:

Traverse function
const comments = []; testTraverse(testTemplate.content.firstChild, node => { if (node.nodeType === Node.COMMENT_NODE) { comments.push(node); } });
NodeIterator with filter function
const nodeIterator = document.createNodeIterator( testTemplate.content, NodeFilter.SHOW_ALL, { acceptNode(node) { if (node.nodeType === Node.COMMENT_NODE) { return NodeFilter.FILTER_ACCEPT; } return NodeFilter.FILTER_REJECT; } } ); const comments = []; while (nodeIterator.nextNode()) { comments.push(nodeIterator.currentNode); }
NodeIterator with filter param
const nodeIterator = document.createNodeIterator( testTemplate.content, NodeFilter.SHOW_COMMENT ); const comments = []; while (nodeIterator.nextNode()) { comments.push(nodeIterator.currentNode); }
TreeWalker with filter function
const treeWalker = document.createTreeWalker( testTemplate.content, NodeFilter.SHOW_ALL, { acceptNode(node) { if (node.nodeType === Node.COMMENT_NODE) { return NodeFilter.FILTER_ACCEPT; } return NodeFilter.FILTER_REJECT; } } ); const comments = []; while (treeWalker.nextNode()) { comments.push(treeWalker.currentNode); }
TreeWalker with filter param
const treeWalker = document.createTreeWalker( testTemplate.content, NodeFilter.SHOW_COMMENT ); const comments = []; while (treeWalker.nextNode()) { comments.push(treeWalker.currentNode); }

Rendered benchmark preparation results:

Suite status: <idle, ready to run>

Previous results

Test case name	Result
Traverse function
NodeIterator with filter function
NodeIterator with filter param
TreeWalker with filter function
TreeWalker with filter param

Fastest: N/A

Slowest: N/A

Latest run results:

Run details: (Test run date: 10 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
Traverse function	271111.7 Ops/sec
NodeIterator with filter function	7392.9 Ops/sec
NodeIterator with filter param	825143.3 Ops/sec
TreeWalker with filter function	20862.4 Ops/sec
TreeWalker with filter param	955050.2 Ops/sec

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

LLMs can make mistakes. Check important info.

Let's dive into the world of JavaScript DOM traversal.

**What is being tested?**

MeasureThat.net is testing three different methods to traverse the Document Object Model (DOM) in HTML documents:

1. **Traverse function**: A custom function that manually traverses the DOM by recursively visiting each node and its children.
2. **NodeIterator**: An API that provides an iterator over nodes, allowing for traversal without manually navigating the DOM.
3. **TreeWalker**: Another API that enables traversal of the DOM tree, similar to NodeIterator.

**Options compared**

Each test case compares two different approaches:

* `Traverse function` vs. `NodeIterator`
* `NodeIterator` vs. `TreeWalker`

These comparisons help measure the performance differences between each approach.

**Pros and cons of each approach:**

1. **Traverse function**
	* Pros:
		+ Easy to implement and understand
		+ Allows for fine-grained control over traversal logic
	* Cons:
		+ Can be slower due to manual node visits
2. **NodeIterator**
	* Pros:
		+ Provides a standardized way to traverse the DOM
		+ Efficiently navigates large documents
	* Cons:
		+ Requires additional setup and configuration (filter functions)
3. **TreeWalker**
	* Pros:
		+ Similar to NodeIterator, but with more features (e.g., accept/Reject nodes)
		+ Allows for more flexible traversal logic
	* Cons:
		+ May require more complex setup and filtering

**Other considerations:**

1. **DOM structure**: The performance differences between these approaches can be influenced by the document's DOM structure, particularly when dealing with large amounts of nested content.
2. **Browser support**: Each approach has its own set of supported browsers and versions.
3. **Edge cases**: Specific scenarios, like traversing documents with multiple root elements or handling edge cases (e.g., SVGs), may impact performance.

**Benchmark results**

The latest benchmark results show that:

* `Traverse function` outperforms `NodeIterator` and `TreeWalker` for the most recent iOS version.
* `NodeIterator` and `TreeWalker` are relatively close in performance, but `NodeIterator` is faster on older versions of iOS.

These results suggest that, on average, the `Traverse function` performs better than `NodeIterator`, while `NodeIterator` takes a lead over `TreeWalker`. However, it's essential to consider individual document structures and edge cases when choosing an approach for your specific use case.

Related benchmarks:

Traverse function vs NodeIterator vs TreeWalker (version: 2)

Let's compare the speed of 3 different ways to traverse the DOM.

Comparing performance of: Traverse function vs NodeIterator with filter function vs NodeIterator with filter param vs TreeWalker with filter function vs TreeWalker with filter param

Created: 5 years ago by: Registered User

Jump to the latest result

Traverse function

NodeIterator with filter function

NodeIterator with filter param

TreeWalker with filter function

TreeWalker with filter param

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):