Obtain smallest value from array in Javascript

Question

Array justPrices has values such as    0    1 5  1    4 5  2    9 9    How do I return the smallest value in the array

User · Answer

If you are using Underscore or Lodash you can get the minimal value using this kind of simple functional pipeline

_.chain([7, 6, -1, 3, 2]).sortBy().first().value()
// -1

You also have the .min function

_.min([7, 6, -1, 3, 2])
// -1

User · Answer

ES6 is the way of the future   arr reduce  a  b    gt  Math min a  b      I prefer this form because it s easily generalized for other use cases

User · Answer

Here is code that will detect the lowest value in an array of numbers     function for finding smallest value in an array function arrayMin array       var min   array 0       for var i   0  i  lt  array length  i             if min  lt  array i                min   min           else if  min  gt  array i                min   array i   1            else if  min    array i                min   min                      return min       call it in this way   var fooArray    1 10 5 2   var foo   arrayMin fooArray      Just change the second else if result from  min   min to min   array i   if you want numbers which reach the smallest value to replace the original number

User · Answer

I think I have an easy-to-understand solution for this  using only the basics of javaScript   function myFunction                 var i   0              var smallestNumber   justPrices 0               for i   0  i  lt  justPrices length  i                      if justPrices i   lt  smallestNumber                        smallestNumber   justPrices i                                               return smallestNumber              The variable smallestNumber is set to the first element of justPrices  and the for loop loops through the array  I m just assuming that you know how a for loop works  if not  look it up   If an element of the array is smaller than the current smallestNumber  which at first is the first element   it will replace it s value  When the whole array has gone through the loop  smallestNumber will contain the smallest number in the array

User · Answer

Update  use Darin s   John Resig answer  just keep in mind that you dont need to specifiy thisArg for min  so Math min apply null  arr  will work just fine     or you can just sort the array and get value  1   2 6 7 4 1  sort   0       But without supplying custom number sorting function  this will only work in one  very limited case  positive numbers less than 10  See how it would break   var a        -0 1  -2  -Infinity  Infinity  0  0 01  2  2 0  2 01  11  1  1e-10  NaN       correct   a sort  function  a b    return a     b   0   a  lt  b   -1  1       Array  NaN  -Infinity  -2  -0 1  0      1e-10  0 01  1  2  2  2 01  11  Infinity      incorrect  a sort      Array      -0 1  -2  -Infinity  0  0 01  1  11  1e-10  2  2  2 01  Infinity  NaN    And  also  array is changed in-place  which might not be what you want

User · Answer

Imagine you have this array   var arr    1  2  3     ES6 way    var min   Math min    arr     min 1   ES5 way    var min   Math min apply null  arr     min 1   If you using D3 js  there is a handy function which does the same  but will ignore undefined values and also check the natural order      d3 max array   accessor        Returns the maximum value in the given array using natural order  If   the array is empty  returns undefined  An optional accessor function   may be specified  which is equivalent to calling array map accessor    before computing the maximum value       Unlike the built-in Math max  this method ignores undefined values    this is useful for ignoring missing data  In addition  elements are   compared using natural order rather than numeric order  For example    the maximum of the strings     20        3     is    3     while the maximum of   the numbers  20  3  is 20    And this is the source code for D3 v4   export default function values  valueof      var n   values length        i   -1        value        max     if  valueof    null        while    i  lt  n       Find the first comparable value        if   value   values i      null  amp  amp  value  gt   value            max   value          while    i  lt  n       Compare the remaining values            if   value   values i      null  amp  amp  value  gt  max                max   value                                             else       while    i  lt  n       Find the first comparable value        if   value   valueof values i   i  values      null  amp  amp  value  gt   value            max   value          while    i  lt  n       Compare the remaining values            if   value   valueof values i   i  values      null  amp  amp  value  gt  max                max   value                                             return max

User · Answer

I find that the easiest way to return the smallest value of an array is to use the Spread Operator on Math min   function    x000D   x000D  return Math min    justPrices   x000D    returns 1 5 on example given  x000D   x000D   x000D    The page on MDN helps to understand it better  https   developer mozilla org en-US docs Web JavaScript Reference Global Objects Math min  A little extra  This also works on Math max   function  return Math max    justPrices     returns 9 9 on example given   Hope this  helps

User · Answer

The tersest expressive code to find the minimum value is probably rest parameters    x000D   x000D  const arr    14  58  20  77  66  82  42  67  42  4  x000D  const min   Math min    arr  x000D  console log min  x000D   x000D   x000D      Rest parameters are essentially a convenient shorthand for Function prototype apply when you don t need to change the function s context    x000D   x000D  var arr    14  58  20  77  66  82  42  67  42  4  x000D  var min   Math min apply Math  arr  x000D  console log min  x000D   x000D   x000D      This is also a great use case for Array prototype reduce    x000D   x000D  const arr    14  58  20  77  66  82  42  67  42  4  x000D  const min   arr reduce  a  b    gt  Math min a  b   x000D  console log min  x000D   x000D   x000D    It may be tempting to pass Math min directly to reduce  however the callback receives additional parameters   callback  accumulator  currentValue  currentIndex  array    In this particular case it may be a bit verbose  reduce is particularly useful when you have a collection of complex data that you want to aggregate into a single value    x000D   x000D  const arr     name   Location 1   distance  14    name   Location 2   distance  58    name   Location 3   distance  20    name   Location 4   distance  77    name   Location 5   distance  66    name   Location 6   distance  82    name   Location 7   distance  42    name   Location 8   distance  67    name   Location 9   distance  42    name   Location 10   distance  4   x000D  const closest   arr reduce  x000D     acc  loc    gt  x000D      acc distance  lt  loc distance x000D          acc x000D          loc x000D    x000D  console log closest  x000D   x000D   x000D      And of course you can always use classic iteration    x000D   x000D  var arr  x000D    i  x000D    l  x000D    min x000D   x000D  arr    14  58  20  77  66  82  42  67  42  4  x000D  min   Number POSITIVE INFINITY x000D  for  i   0  l   arr length  i  lt  l  i      x000D    min   Math min min  arr i   x000D    x000D  console log min  x000D   x000D   x000D       but even classic iteration can get a modern makeover    x000D   x000D  const arr    14  58  20  77  66  82  42  67  42  4  x000D  let min   Number POSITIVE INFINITY x000D  for  const value of arr    x000D    min   Math min min  value  x000D    x000D  console log min  x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

function tinyFriends         let myFriends     quot Mukit quot    quot Ali quot    quot Umor quot    quot sabbir quot       let smallestFridend   myFriends 0       for  i   0  i  lt  myFriends length  i              if  myFriends i   lt  smallestFridend                smallestFridend   myFriends i                       return smallestFridend

User · Answer

Jon Resig illustrated in this article how this could be achieved by extending the Array prototype and invoking the underlying Math min method which unfortunately doesn t take an array but a variable number of arguments   Array min   function  array        return Math min apply  Math  array         and then   var minimum   Array min array

User · Answer

Here is a recursive way on how to do it using ternary operators both for the recursion and decision whether you came across a min number or not   const findMin    arr  min  i    gt  arr length     i   min     findMin arr  min   arr i   lt  min   arr i    min    i    Code snippet   x000D   x000D  const findMin    arr  min  i    gt  arr length     i   min   x000D    findMin arr  min   arr i   lt  min   arr i    min    i  x000D     x000D  const arr    5  34  2  1  6  7  9  3   x000D  const min   findMin arr  arr 0   0  x000D  console log min   x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

x000D   x000D  function smallest    x000D    if arguments 0  instanceof Array  x000D      arguments   arguments 0   x000D   x000D    return Math min apply  Math  arguments    x000D    x000D  function largest    x000D    if arguments 0  instanceof Array  x000D      arguments   arguments 0   x000D   x000D    return Math max apply  Math  arguments    x000D    x000D  var min   smallest 10  11  12  13   x000D  var max   largest  10  11  12  13    x000D   x000D  console log  Smallest     min     Largest     max   x000D   x000D   x000D

User · Answer

var array   2 3 1 9 8   var minvalue   array 0    for  var i   0  i  lt  array length  i          if array i  lt minvalue                minvalue   array i              console log minvalue

User · Answer

Possibly an easier way   Let s say justPrices is mixed up in terms of value  so you don t know where the smallest value is   justPrices 0    4 5 justPrices 1    9 9 justPrices 2    1 5   Use sort   justPrices sort      It would then put them in order for you   Can also be done alphabetically   The array then would be put in ascending order   justPrices 0    1 5 justPrices 1    4 5 justPrices 2    9 9   You can then easily grab by the first index   justPrices 0    I find this is a bit more useful than what s proposed above because what if you need the lowest 3 numbers as an example  You can also switch which order they re arranged  more info at http   www w3schools com jsref jsref sort asp

User · Answer

For anyone out there who needs this I just have a feeling   Get the smallest number with multi values in the array  Thanks to Akexis answer  if you have let s say an array of Distance and ID and ETA in minutes So you do push maybe in for loop or something Distances push  1 3  1  2       Array inside an array   And then when It finishes  do a sort Distances sort     So this will sort upon the first thing which is Distance here  Now we have the closest or the least is the first you can do Distances 0     The closest distance or the smallest number of distance   array

User · Answer

Here   s a variant of Darin Dimitrov   s answer that doesn   t modify the Array prototype  const applyToArray    func  array    gt  func apply Math  array   applyToArray Math min   1 2 3 4      1 applyToArray Math max   1 2 3 4      4

[javascript] Obtain smallest value from array in Javascript?

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