How to get the difference between two arrays in JavaScript?

ghz 1years ago ⋅ 5503 views

Question

Is there a way to return the difference between two arrays in JavaScript?

For example:

var a1 = ['a', 'b'];
var a2 = ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd'];

// need ["c", "d"]

Answer

This answer was written in 2009, so it is a bit outdated, also it's rather educational for understanding the problem. Best solution I'd use today would be

let difference = arr1.filter(x => !arr2.includes(x));

(credits to other author here)

I assume you are comparing a normal array. If not, you need to change the for loop to a for .. in loop.

function arr_diff (a1, a2) {

    var a = [], diff = [];

    for (var i = 0; i < a1.length; i++) {
        a[a1[i]] = true;
    }

    for (var i = 0; i < a2.length; i++) {
        if (a[a2[i]]) {
            delete a[a2[i]];
        } else {
            a[a2[i]] = true;
        }
    }

    for (var k in a) {
        diff.push(k);
    }

    return diff;
}

console.log(arr_diff(['a', 'b'], ['a', 'b', 'c', 'd']));
console.log(arr_diff("abcd", "abcde"));
console.log(arr_diff("zxc", "zxc"));
#javascript