define assignment in javascript

JS Tutorial

Js versions, js functions, js html dom, js browser bom, js web apis, js vs jquery, js graphics, js examples, js references, javascript assignment, javascript assignment operators.

Assignment operators assign values to JavaScript variables.

Shift Assignment Operators

Bitwise Assignment Operators

Logical Assignment Operators

The = Operator

The Simple Assignment Operator assigns a value to a variable.

Simple Assignment Examples

The += operator.

The Addition Assignment Operator adds a value to a variable.

Addition Assignment Examples

The -= operator.

The Subtraction Assignment Operator subtracts a value from a variable.

Subtraction Assignment Example

The *= operator.

The Multiplication Assignment Operator multiplies a variable.

Multiplication Assignment Example

The **= operator.

The Exponentiation Assignment Operator raises a variable to the power of the operand.

Exponentiation Assignment Example

The /= operator.

The Division Assignment Operator divides a variable.

Division Assignment Example

The %= operator.

The Remainder Assignment Operator assigns a remainder to a variable.

Remainder Assignment Example

Advertisement

The <<= Operator

The Left Shift Assignment Operator left shifts a variable.

Left Shift Assignment Example

The >>= operator.

The Right Shift Assignment Operator right shifts a variable (signed).

Right Shift Assignment Example

The >>>= operator.

The Unsigned Right Shift Assignment Operator right shifts a variable (unsigned).

Unsigned Right Shift Assignment Example

The &= operator.

The Bitwise AND Assignment Operator does a bitwise AND operation on two operands and assigns the result to the the variable.

Bitwise AND Assignment Example

The |= operator.

The Bitwise OR Assignment Operator does a bitwise OR operation on two operands and assigns the result to the variable.

Bitwise OR Assignment Example

The ^= operator.

The Bitwise XOR Assignment Operator does a bitwise XOR operation on two operands and assigns the result to the variable.

Bitwise XOR Assignment Example

The &&= operator.

The Logical AND assignment operator is used between two values.

If the first value is true, the second value is assigned.

Logical AND Assignment Example

The &&= operator is an ES2020 feature .

The ||= Operator

The Logical OR assignment operator is used between two values.

If the first value is false, the second value is assigned.

Logical OR Assignment Example

The ||= operator is an ES2020 feature .

The ??= Operator

The Nullish coalescing assignment operator is used between two values.

If the first value is undefined or null, the second value is assigned.

Nullish Coalescing Assignment Example

The ??= operator is an ES2020 feature .

Test Yourself With Exercises

Use the correct assignment operator that will result in x being 15 (same as x = x + y ).

Start the Exercise

COLOR PICKER

Contact Sales

If you want to use W3Schools services as an educational institution, team or enterprise, send us an e-mail: [email protected]

Report Error

If you want to report an error, or if you want to make a suggestion, send us an e-mail: [email protected]

Top Tutorials

Top references, top examples, get certified.

Home » JavaScript Tutorial » JavaScript Assignment Operators

JavaScript Assignment Operators

Summary : in this tutorial, you will learn how to use JavaScript assignment operators to assign a value to a variable.

Introduction to JavaScript assignment operators

An assignment operator ( = ) assigns a value to a variable. The syntax of the assignment operator is as follows:

In this syntax, JavaScript evaluates the expression b first and assigns the result to the variable a .

The following example declares the counter variable and initializes its value to zero:

The following example increases the counter variable by one and assigns the result to the counter variable:

When evaluating the second statement, JavaScript evaluates the expression on the right-hand first ( counter + 1 ) and assigns the result to the counter variable. After the second assignment, the counter variable is 1 .

To make the code more concise, you can use the += operator like this:

In this syntax, you don’t have to repeat the counter variable twice in the assignment.

The following table illustrates assignment operators that are shorthand for another operator and the assignment:

Chaining JavaScript assignment operators

If you want to assign a single value to multiple variables, you can chain the assignment operators. For example:

In this example, JavaScript evaluates from right to left. Therefore, it does the following:

• Use the assignment operator ( = ) to assign a value to a variable.
• Chain the assignment operators if you want to assign a single value to multiple variables.

JAVASCRIPT ASSIGNMENT OPERATORS

In this tutorial, you will learn about all the different assignment operators in javascript and how to use them in javascript.

Assignment Operators

In javascript, there are 16 different assignment operators that are used to assign value to the variable. It is shorthand of other operators which is recommended to use.

The assignment operators are used to assign value based on the right operand to its left operand.

The left operand must be a variable while the right operand may be a variable, number, boolean, string, expression, object, or combination of any other.

One of the most basic assignment operators is equal = , which is used to directly assign a value.

Assignment Operators List

Here is the list of all assignment operators in JavaScript:

In the following table if variable a is not defined then assume it to be 10.

Assignment operator

The assignment operator = is the simplest value assigning operator which assigns a given value to a variable.

The assignment operators support chaining, which means you can assign a single value in multiple variables in a single line.

Addition assignment operator

The addition assignment operator += is used to add the value of the right operand to the value of the left operand and assigns the result to the left operand.

On the basis of the data type of variable, the addition assignment operator may add or concatenate the variables.

Subtraction assignment operator

The subtraction assignment operator -= subtracts the value of the right operand from the value of the left operand and assigns the result to the left operand.

If the value can not be subtracted then it results in a NaN .

Multiplication assignment operator

The multiplication assignment operator *= assigns the result to the left operand after multiplying values of the left and right operand.

Division assignment operator

The division assignment operator /= divides the value of the left operand by the value of the right operand and assigns the result to the left operand.

Remainder assignment operator

The remainder assignment operator %= assigns the remainder to the left operand after dividing the value of the left operand by the value of the right operand.

Exponentiation assignment operator

The exponential assignment operator **= assigns the result of exponentiation to the left operand after exponentiating the value of the left operand by the value of the right operand.

Left shift assignment

The left shift assignment operator <<= assigns the result of the left shift to the left operand after shifting the value of the left operand by the value of the right operand.

Right shift assignment

The right shift assignment operator >>= assigns the result of the right shift to the left operand after shifting the value of the left operand by the value of the right operand.

Unsigned right shift assignment

The unsigned right shift assignment operator >>>= assigns the result of the unsigned right shift to the left operand after shifting the value of the left operand by the value of the right operand.

Bitwise AND assignment

The bitwise AND assignment operator &= assigns the result of bitwise AND to the left operand after ANDing the value of the left operand by the value of the right operand.

Bitwise OR assignment

The bitwise OR assignment operator |= assigns the result of bitwise OR to the left operand after ORing the value of left operand by the value of the right operand.

Bitwise XOR assignment

The bitwise XOR assignment operator ^= assigns the result of bitwise XOR to the left operand after XORing the value of the left operand by the value of the right operand.

Logical AND assignment

The logical AND assignment operator &&= assigns value to left operand only when it is truthy .

Note : A truthy value is a value that is considered true when encountered in a boolean context.

Logical OR assignment

The logical OR assignment operator ||= assigns value to left operand only when it is falsy .

Note : A falsy value is a value that is considered false when encountered in a boolean context.

Logical nullish assignment

The logical nullish assignment operator ??= assigns value to left operand only when it is nullish ( null or undefined ).

• Skip to main content
• Select language
• Skip to search
• Expressions and operators
• Operator precedence

Left-hand-side expressions

« Previous Next »

This chapter describes JavaScript's expressions and operators, including assignment, comparison, arithmetic, bitwise, logical, string, ternary and more.

A complete and detailed list of operators and expressions is also available in the reference .

JavaScript has the following types of operators. This section describes the operators and contains information about operator precedence.

• Assignment operators
• Comparison operators
• Arithmetic operators
• Bitwise operators

Logical operators

String operators, conditional (ternary) operator.

• Comma operator

Unary operators

• Relational operator

JavaScript has both binary and unary operators, and one special ternary operator, the conditional operator. A binary operator requires two operands, one before the operator and one after the operator:

For example, 3+4 or x*y .

A unary operator requires a single operand, either before or after the operator:

For example, x++ or ++x .

An assignment operator assigns a value to its left operand based on the value of its right operand. The simple assignment operator is equal ( = ), which assigns the value of its right operand to its left operand. That is, x = y assigns the value of y to x .

There are also compound assignment operators that are shorthand for the operations listed in the following table:

Destructuring

For more complex assignments, the destructuring assignment syntax is a JavaScript expression that makes it possible to extract data from arrays or objects using a syntax that mirrors the construction of array and object literals.

A comparison operator compares its operands and returns a logical value based on whether the comparison is true. The operands can be numerical, string, logical, or object values. Strings are compared based on standard lexicographical ordering, using Unicode values. In most cases, if the two operands are not of the same type, JavaScript attempts to convert them to an appropriate type for the comparison. This behavior generally results in comparing the operands numerically. The sole exceptions to type conversion within comparisons involve the === and !== operators, which perform strict equality and inequality comparisons. These operators do not attempt to convert the operands to compatible types before checking equality. The following table describes the comparison operators in terms of this sample code:

Note:  ( => ) is not an operator, but the notation for Arrow functions .

An arithmetic operator takes numerical values (either literals or variables) as their operands and returns a single numerical value. The standard arithmetic operators are addition ( + ), subtraction ( - ), multiplication ( * ), and division ( / ). These operators work as they do in most other programming languages when used with floating point numbers (in particular, note that division by zero produces Infinity ). For example:

In addition to the standard arithmetic operations (+, -, * /), JavaScript provides the arithmetic operators listed in the following table:

A bitwise operator treats their operands as a set of 32 bits (zeros and ones), rather than as decimal, hexadecimal, or octal numbers. For example, the decimal number nine has a binary representation of 1001. Bitwise operators perform their operations on such binary representations, but they return standard JavaScript numerical values.

The following table summarizes JavaScript's bitwise operators.

Bitwise logical operators

Conceptually, the bitwise logical operators work as follows:

• The operands are converted to thirty-two-bit integers and expressed by a series of bits (zeros and ones). Numbers with more than 32 bits get their most significant bits discarded. For example, the following integer with more than 32 bits will be converted to a 32 bit integer: Before: 11100110111110100000000000000110000000000001 After: 10100000000000000110000000000001
• Each bit in the first operand is paired with the corresponding bit in the second operand: first bit to first bit, second bit to second bit, and so on.
• The operator is applied to each pair of bits, and the result is constructed bitwise.

For example, the binary representation of nine is 1001, and the binary representation of fifteen is 1111. So, when the bitwise operators are applied to these values, the results are as follows:

Note that all 32 bits are inverted using the Bitwise NOT operator, and that values with the most significant (left-most) bit set to 1 represent negative numbers (two's-complement representation).

Bitwise shift operators

The bitwise shift operators take two operands: the first is a quantity to be shifted, and the second specifies the number of bit positions by which the first operand is to be shifted. The direction of the shift operation is controlled by the operator used.

Shift operators convert their operands to thirty-two-bit integers and return a result of the same type as the left operand.

The shift operators are listed in the following table.

Logical operators are typically used with Boolean (logical) values; when they are, they return a Boolean value. However, the && and || operators actually return the value of one of the specified operands, so if these operators are used with non-Boolean values, they may return a non-Boolean value. The logical operators are described in the following table.

Examples of expressions that can be converted to false are those that evaluate to null, 0, NaN, the empty string (""), or undefined.

The following code shows examples of the && (logical AND) operator.

The following code shows examples of the || (logical OR) operator.

The following code shows examples of the ! (logical NOT) operator.

Short-circuit evaluation

As logical expressions are evaluated left to right, they are tested for possible "short-circuit" evaluation using the following rules:

• false && anything is short-circuit evaluated to false.
• true || anything is short-circuit evaluated to true.

The rules of logic guarantee that these evaluations are always correct. Note that the anything part of the above expressions is not evaluated, so any side effects of doing so do not take effect.

In addition to the comparison operators, which can be used on string values, the concatenation operator (+) concatenates two string values together, returning another string that is the union of the two operand strings.

For example,

The shorthand assignment operator += can also be used to concatenate strings.

The conditional operator is the only JavaScript operator that takes three operands. The operator can have one of two values based on a condition. The syntax is:

If condition is true, the operator has the value of val1 . Otherwise it has the value of val2 . You can use the conditional operator anywhere you would use a standard operator.

This statement assigns the value "adult" to the variable status if age is eighteen or more. Otherwise, it assigns the value "minor" to status .

The comma operator ( , ) simply evaluates both of its operands and returns the value of the last operand. This operator is primarily used inside a for loop, to allow multiple variables to be updated each time through the loop.

For example, if a is a 2-dimensional array with 10 elements on a side, the following code uses the comma operator to update two variables at once. The code prints the values of the diagonal elements in the array:

A unary operation is an operation with only one operand.

The delete operator deletes an object, an object's property, or an element at a specified index in an array. The syntax is:

where objectName is the name of an object, property is an existing property, and index is an integer representing the location of an element in an array.

The fourth form is legal only within a with statement, to delete a property from an object.

You can use the delete operator to delete variables declared implicitly but not those declared with the var statement.

If the delete operator succeeds, it sets the property or element to undefined . The delete operator returns true if the operation is possible; it returns false if the operation is not possible.

Deleting array elements

When you delete an array element, the array length is not affected. For example, if you delete a[3] , a[4] is still a[4] and a[3] is undefined.

When the delete operator removes an array element, that element is no longer in the array. In the following example, trees[3] is removed with delete . However, trees[3] is still addressable and returns undefined .

If you want an array element to exist but have an undefined value, use the undefined keyword instead of the delete operator. In the following example, trees[3] is assigned the value undefined , but the array element still exists:

The typeof operator is used in either of the following ways:

The typeof operator returns a string indicating the type of the unevaluated operand. operand is the string, variable, keyword, or object for which the type is to be returned. The parentheses are optional.

Suppose you define the following variables:

The typeof operator returns the following results for these variables:

For the keywords true and null , the typeof operator returns the following results:

For a number or string, the typeof operator returns the following results:

For property values, the typeof operator returns the type of value the property contains:

For methods and functions, the typeof operator returns results as follows:

For predefined objects, the typeof operator returns results as follows:

The void operator is used in either of the following ways:

The void operator specifies an expression to be evaluated without returning a value. expression is a JavaScript expression to evaluate. The parentheses surrounding the expression are optional, but it is good style to use them.

You can use the void operator to specify an expression as a hypertext link. The expression is evaluated but is not loaded in place of the current document.

The following code creates a hypertext link that does nothing when the user clicks it. When the user clicks the link, void(0) evaluates to undefined , which has no effect in JavaScript.

The following code creates a hypertext link that submits a form when the user clicks it.

Relational operators

A relational operator compares its operands and returns a Boolean value based on whether the comparison is true.

The in operator returns true if the specified property is in the specified object. The syntax is:

where propNameOrNumber is a string or numeric expression representing a property name or array index, and objectName is the name of an object.

The following examples show some uses of the in operator.

The instanceof operator returns true if the specified object is of the specified object type. The syntax is:

where objectName is the name of the object to compare to objectType , and objectType is an object type, such as Date or Array .

Use instanceof when you need to confirm the type of an object at runtime. For example, when catching exceptions, you can branch to different exception-handling code depending on the type of exception thrown.

For example, the following code uses instanceof to determine whether theDay is a Date object. Because theDay is a Date object, the statements in the if statement execute.

The precedence of operators determines the order they are applied when evaluating an expression. You can override operator precedence by using parentheses.

The following table describes the precedence of operators, from highest to lowest.

A more detailed version of this table, complete with links to additional details about each operator, may be found in JavaScript Reference .

• Expressions

An expression is any valid unit of code that resolves to a value.

Every syntactically valid expression resolves to some value but conceptually, there are two types of expressions: with side effects (for example: those that assign value to a variable) and those that in some sense evaluates and therefore resolves to value.

The expression x = 7 is an example of the first type. This expression uses the = operator to assign the value seven to the variable x . The expression itself evaluates to seven.

The code 3 + 4 is an example of the second expression type. This expression uses the + operator to add three and four together without assigning the result, seven, to a variable. JavaScript has the following expression categories:

• Arithmetic: evaluates to a number, for example 3.14159. (Generally uses arithmetic operators .)
• String: evaluates to a character string, for example, "Fred" or "234". (Generally uses string operators .)
• Logical: evaluates to true or false. (Often involves logical operators .)
• Primary expressions: Basic keywords and general expressions in JavaScript.
• Left-hand-side expressions: Left values are the destination of an assignment.

Primary expressions

Basic keywords and general expressions in JavaScript.

Use the this keyword to refer to the current object. In general, this refers to the calling object in a method. Use this either with the dot or the bracket notation:

Suppose a function called validate validates an object's value property, given the object and the high and low values:

You could call validate in each form element's onChange event handler, using this to pass it the form element, as in the following example:

• Grouping operator

The grouping operator ( ) controls the precedence of evaluation in expressions. For example, you can override multiplication and division first, then addition and subtraction to evaluate addition first.

Comprehensions

Comprehensions are an experimental JavaScript feature, targeted to be included in a future ECMAScript version. There are two versions of comprehensions:

Comprehensions exist in many programming languages and allow you to quickly assemble a new array based on an existing one, for example.

Left values are the destination of an assignment.

You can use the new operator to create an instance of a user-defined object type or of one of the built-in object types. Use new as follows:

The super keyword is used to call functions on an object's parent. It is useful with classes to call the parent constructor, for example.

Spread operator

The spread operator allows an expression to be expanded in places where multiple arguments (for function calls) or multiple elements (for array literals) are expected.

Example: Today if you have an array and want to create a new array with the existing one being part of it, the array literal syntax is no longer sufficient and you have to fall back to imperative code, using a combination of push , splice , concat , etc. With spread syntax this becomes much more succinct:

Similarly, the spread operator works with function calls:

Document Tags and Contributors

• l10n:priority
• JavaScript basics
• JavaScript first steps
• JavaScript building blocks
• Introducing JavaScript objects
• Introduction
• Grammar and types
• Control flow and error handling
• Loops and iteration
• Numbers and dates
• Text formatting
• Regular expressions
• Indexed collections
• Keyed collections
• Working with objects
• Details of the object model
• Iterators and generators
• Meta programming
• A re-introduction to JavaScript
• JavaScript data structures
• Equality comparisons and sameness
• Inheritance and the prototype chain
• Strict mode
• JavaScript typed arrays
• Memory Management
• Concurrency model and Event Loop
• References:
• ArrayBuffer
• AsyncFunction
• Float32Array
• Float64Array
• GeneratorFunction
• InternalError
• Intl.Collator
• Intl.DateTimeFormat
• Intl.NumberFormat
• ParallelArray
• ReferenceError
• SIMD.Bool16x8
• SIMD.Bool32x4
• SIMD.Bool64x2
• SIMD.Bool8x16
• SIMD.Float32x4
• SIMD.Float64x2
• SIMD.Int16x8
• SIMD.Int32x4
• SIMD.Int8x16
• SIMD.Uint16x8
• SIMD.Uint32x4
• SIMD.Uint8x16
• SharedArrayBuffer
• StopIteration
• SyntaxError
• Uint16Array
• Uint32Array
• Uint8ClampedArray
• WebAssembly
• decodeURI()
• decodeURIComponent()
• encodeURI()
• encodeURIComponent()
• parseFloat()
• Array comprehensions
• Conditional (ternary) Operator
• Destructuring assignment
• Expression closures
• Generator comprehensions
• Legacy generator function expression
• Logical Operators
• Object initializer
• Property accessors
• Spread syntax
• async function expression
• class expression
• delete operator
• function expression
• function* expression
• in operator
• new operator
• void operator
• Legacy generator function
• async function
• for each...in
• function declaration
• try...catch
• Arguments object
• Arrow functions
• Default parameters
• Method definitions
• Rest parameters
• constructor
• element loaded from a different domain for which you violated the same-origin policy.">Error: Permission denied to access property "x"
• InternalError: too much recursion
• RangeError: argument is not a valid code point
• RangeError: invalid array length
• RangeError: invalid date
• RangeError: precision is out of range
• RangeError: radix must be an integer
• RangeError: repeat count must be less than infinity
• RangeError: repeat count must be non-negative
• ReferenceError: "x" is not defined
• ReferenceError: assignment to undeclared variable "x"
• ReferenceError: can't access lexical declaration`X' before initialization
• ReferenceError: deprecated caller or arguments usage
• ReferenceError: invalid assignment left-hand side
• ReferenceError: reference to undefined property "x"
• SyntaxError: "0"-prefixed octal literals and octal escape seq. are deprecated
• SyntaxError: "use strict" not allowed in function with non-simple parameters
• SyntaxError: "x" is a reserved identifier
• SyntaxError: JSON.parse: bad parsing
• SyntaxError: Malformed formal parameter
• SyntaxError: Unexpected token
• SyntaxError: Using //@ to indicate sourceURL pragmas is deprecated. Use //# instead
• SyntaxError: a declaration in the head of a for-of loop can't have an initializer
• SyntaxError: applying the 'delete' operator to an unqualified name is deprecated
• SyntaxError: for-in loop head declarations may not have initializers
• SyntaxError: function statement requires a name
• SyntaxError: identifier starts immediately after numeric literal
• SyntaxError: illegal character
• SyntaxError: invalid regular expression flag "x"
• SyntaxError: missing ) after argument list
• SyntaxError: missing ) after condition
• SyntaxError: missing : after property id
• SyntaxError: missing ; before statement
• SyntaxError: missing = in const declaration
• SyntaxError: missing ] after element list
• SyntaxError: missing formal parameter
• SyntaxError: missing name after . operator
• SyntaxError: missing variable name
• SyntaxError: missing } after function body
• SyntaxError: missing } after property list
• SyntaxError: redeclaration of formal parameter "x"
• SyntaxError: return not in function
• SyntaxError: test for equality (==) mistyped as assignment (=)?
• SyntaxError: unterminated string literal
• TypeError: "x" has no properties
• TypeError: "x" is (not) "y"
• TypeError: "x" is not a constructor
• TypeError: "x" is not a function
• TypeError: "x" is not a non-null object
• TypeError: "x" is read-only
• TypeError: More arguments needed
• TypeError: can't access dead object
• TypeError: can't define property "x": "obj" is not extensible
• TypeError: can't delete non-configurable array element
• TypeError: can't redefine non-configurable property "x"
• TypeError: cyclic object value
• TypeError: invalid 'in' operand "x"
• TypeError: invalid Array.prototype.sort argument
• TypeError: invalid arguments
• TypeError: invalid assignment to const "x"
• TypeError: property "x" is non-configurable and can't be deleted
• TypeError: setting getter-only property "x"
• TypeError: variable "x" redeclares argument
• URIError: malformed URI sequence
• Warning: -file- is being assigned a //# sourceMappingURL, but already has one
• Warning: 08/09 is not a legal ECMA-262 octal constant
• Warning: Date.prototype.toLocaleFormat is deprecated
• Warning: JavaScript 1.6's for-each-in loops are deprecated
• Warning: String.x is deprecated; use String.prototype.x instead
• Warning: expression closures are deprecated
• Warning: unreachable code after return statement
• JavaScript technologies overview
• Lexical grammar
• Enumerability and ownership of properties
• Iteration protocols
• Transitioning to strict mode
• Template literals
• Deprecated features
• ECMAScript 2015 support in Mozilla
• ECMAScript 5 support in Mozilla
• ECMAScript Next support in Mozilla
• Firefox JavaScript changelog
• New in JavaScript 1.1
• New in JavaScript 1.2
• New in JavaScript 1.3
• New in JavaScript 1.4
• New in JavaScript 1.5
• New in JavaScript 1.6
• New in JavaScript 1.7
• New in JavaScript 1.8
• New in JavaScript 1.8.1
• New in JavaScript 1.8.5
• Documentation:
• All pages index
• Methods index
• Properties index
• Pages tagged "JavaScript"
• JavaScript doc status
• The MDN project

• Skip to main content
• Select language
• Skip to search
• Add a translation
• Print this page
• Assignment operators

An assignment operator assigns a value to its left operand based on the value of its right operand.

The basic assignment operator is equal ( = ), which assigns the value of its right operand to its left operand. That is, x = y assigns the value of y to x . The other assignment operators are usually shorthand for standard operations, as shown in the following definitions and examples.

Simple assignment operator which assigns a value to a variable. Chaining the assignment operator is possible in order to assign a single value to multiple variables. See the example.

Addition assignment

The addition assignment operator adds the value of the right operand to a variable and assigns the result to the variable. The types of the two operands determine the behavior of the addition assignment operator. Addition or concatenation is possible. See the addition operator for more details.

Subtraction assignment

The subtraction assignment operator subtracts the value of the right operand from a variable and assigns the result to the variable. See the subtraction operator for more details.

Multiplication assignment

The multiplication assignment operator multiplies a variable by the value of the right operand and assigns the result to the variable. See the multiplication operator for more details.

Division assignment

The division assignment operator divides a variable by the value of the right operand and assigns the result to the variable. See the division operator for more details.

Remainder assignment

The remainder assignment operator divides a variable by the value of the right operand and assigns the remainder to the variable. See the remainder operator for more details.

Left shift assignment

The left shift assignment operator moves the specified amount of bits to the left and assigns the result to the variable. See the left shift operator for more details.

Right shift assignment

The right shift assignment operator moves the specified amount of bits to the right and assigns the result to the variable. See the right shift operator for more details.

Unsigned right shift assignment

The unsigned right shift assignment operator moves the specified amount of bits to the right and assigns the result to the variable. See the unsigned right shift operator for more details.

Bitwise AND assignment

The bitwise AND assignment operator uses the binary representation of both operands, does a bitwise AND operation on them and assigns the result to the variable. See the bitwise AND operator for more details.

Bitwise XOR assignment

The bitwise XOR assignment operator uses the binary representation of both operands, does a bitwise XOR operation on them and assigns the result to the variable. See the bitwise XOR operator for more details.

Bitwise OR assignment

The bitwise OR assignment operator uses the binary representation of both operands, does a bitwise OR operation on them and assigns the result to the variable. See the bitwise OR operator for more details.

Left operand with another assignment operator

In unusual situations, the assignment operator (e.g. x += y ) is not identical to the meaning expression (here x = x + y ). When the left operand of an assignment operator itself contains an assignment operator, the left operand is evaluated only once. For example:

Specifications

Browser compatibility

• Arithmetic operators

Document Tags and Contributors

• Introduction
• Grammar and types
• Control flow and error handling
• Loops and iteration
• Expressions and operators
• Numbers and dates
• Text formatting
• Indexed collections
• Keyed collections
• Working with objects
• Details of the object model
• Iterators and generators
• Meta programming
• JavaScript basics
• JavaScript technologies overview
• Introduction to Object Oriented JavaScript
• A re-introduction to JavaScript
• JavaScript data structures
• Equality comparisons and sameness
• Inheritance and the prototype chain
• Strict mode
• JavaScript typed arrays
• Memory Management
• Concurrency model and Event Loop
• References:
• Standard built-in objects
• ArrayBuffer
• Float32Array
• Float64Array
• GeneratorFunction
• InternalError
• Intl.Collator
• Intl.DateTimeFormat
• Intl.NumberFormat
• ParallelArray
• ReferenceError
• StopIteration
• SyntaxError
• Uint16Array
• Uint32Array
• Uint8ClampedArray
• decodeURI()
• decodeURIComponent()
• encodeURI()
• encodeURIComponent()
• parseFloat()
• Array comprehensions
• Bitwise operators
• Comma operator
• Comparison operators
• Conditional (ternary) Operator
• Destructuring assignment
• Expression closures
• Generator comprehensions
• Grouping operator
• Legacy generator function expression
• Logical Operators
• Object initializer
• Operator precedence
• Property accessors
• Spread operator
• class expression
• delete operator
• function expression
• function* expression
• in operator
• new operator
• void operator
• Statements and declarations
• Legacy generator function
• for each...in
• try...catch
• Arguments object
• Arrow functions
• Default parameters
• Method definitions
• Rest parameters
• constructor
• Lexical grammar
• Enumerability and ownership of properties
• Iteration protocols
• Transitioning to strict mode
• Template strings
• Deprecated features
• New in JavaScript
• ECMAScript 5 support in Mozilla
• ECMAScript 6 support in Mozilla
• ECMAScript 7 support in Mozilla
• Firefox JavaScript changelog
• New in JavaScript 1.1
• New in JavaScript 1.2
• New in JavaScript 1.3
• New in JavaScript 1.4
• New in JavaScript 1.5
• New in JavaScript 1.6
• New in JavaScript 1.7
• New in JavaScript 1.8
• New in JavaScript 1.8.1
• New in JavaScript 1.8.5
• Documentation:
• All pages index
• Methods index
• Properties index
• Pages tagged "JavaScript"
• JavaScript doc status
• The MDN project

Popular Tutorials

Popular examples, reference materials, learn python interactively, js introduction.

• Getting Started
• JS Variables & Constants
• JS console.log
• JavaScript Data types

JavaScript Operators

• JavaScript Comments
• JS Type Conversions

JS Control Flow

• JS Comparison Operators
• JavaScript if else Statement
• JavaScript for loop
• JavaScript while loop
• JavaScript break Statement
• JavaScript continue Statement
• JavaScript switch Statement

JS Functions

• JavaScript Function
• Variable Scope
• JavaScript Hoisting
• JavaScript Recursion
• JavaScript Objects
• JavaScript Methods & this
• JavaScript Constructor
• JavaScript Getter and Setter
• JavaScript Prototype
• JavaScript Array
• JS Multidimensional Array
• JavaScript String
• JavaScript for...in loop
• JavaScript Number
• JavaScript Symbol

Exceptions and Modules

• JavaScript try...catch...finally
• JavaScript throw Statement
• JavaScript Modules
• JavaScript ES6
• JavaScript Arrow Function
• JavaScript Default Parameters
• JavaScript Template Literals
• JavaScript Spread Operator
• JavaScript Map
• JavaScript Set
• Destructuring Assignment
• JavaScript Classes
• JavaScript Inheritance
• JavaScript for...of
• JavaScript Proxies

JavaScript Asynchronous

• JavaScript setTimeout()
• JavaScript CallBack Function
• JavaScript Promise
• Javascript async/await
• JavaScript setInterval()

Miscellaneous

• JavaScript JSON
• JavaScript Date and Time
• JavaScript Closure
• JavaScript this
• JavaScript use strict
• Iterators and Iterables
• JavaScript Generators
• JavaScript Regular Expressions
• JavaScript Browser Debugging
• Uses of JavaScript

JavaScript Tutorials

JavaScript Comparison and Logical Operators

JavaScript Ternary Operator

JavaScript Booleans

JavaScript Bitwise Operators

• JavaScript Object.is()
• JavaScript typeof Operator

JavaScript operators are special symbols that perform operations on one or more operands (values). For example,

Here, we used the + operator to add the operands 2 and 3 .

JavaScript Operator Types

Here is a list of different JavaScript operators you will learn in this tutorial:

• Arithmetic Operators
• Assignment Operators
• Comparison Operators
• Logical Operators
• Bitwise Operators
• String Operators
• Miscellaneous Operators

1. JavaScript Arithmetic Operators

We use arithmetic operators to perform arithmetic calculations like addition, subtraction, etc. For example,

Here, we used the - operator to subtract 3 from 5 .

Commonly Used Arithmetic Operators

Example 1: Arithmetic Operators in JavaScript

Note: The increment operator ++ adds 1 to the operand. And, the decrement operator -- decreases the value of the operand by 1 .

To learn more, visit Increment ++ and Decrement -- Operators .

2. JavaScript Assignment Operators

We use assignment operators to assign values to variables. For example,

Here, we used the = operator to assign the value 5 to the variable x .

Commonly Used Assignment Operators

Example 2: Assignment Operators in JavaScript

3. javascript comparison operators.

We use comparison operators to compare two values and return a boolean value ( true or false ). For example,

Here, we have used the > comparison operator to check whether a (whose value is 3 ) is greater than b (whose value is 2 ).

Since 3 is greater than 2 , we get true as output.

Note: In the above example, a > b is called a boolean expression since evaluating it results in a boolean value.

Commonly Used Comparison Operators

Example 3: Comparison Operators in JavaScript

The equality operators ( == and != ) convert both operands to the same type before comparing their values. For example,

Here, we used the == operator to compare the number 3 and the string 3 .

By default, JavaScript converts string 3 to number 3 and compares the values.

However, the strict equality operators ( === and !== ) do not convert operand types before comparing their values. For example,

Here, JavaScript didn't convert string 4 to number 4 before comparing their values.

Thus, the result is false , as number 4 isn't equal to string 4 .

4. JavaScript Logical Operators

We use logical operators to perform logical operations on boolean expressions. For example,

Here, && is the logical operator AND . Since both x < 6 and y < 5 are true , the combined result is true .

Commonly Used Logical Operators

Example 4: Logical Operators in JavaScript

Note: We use comparison and logical operators in decision-making and loops. You will learn about them in detail in later tutorials.

More on JavaScript Operators

We use bitwise operators to perform binary operations on integers.

Note: We rarely use bitwise operators in everyday programming. If you are interested, visit JavaScript Bitwise Operators to learn more.

In JavaScript, you can also use the + operator to concatenate (join) two strings. For example,

Here, we used the + operator to concatenate str1 and str2 .

JavaScript has many more operators besides the ones we listed above. You will learn about them in detail in later tutorials.

Table of Contents

• Introduction
• JavaScript Arithmetic Operators
• JavaScript Assignment Operators
• JavaScript Comparison Operators
• JavaScript Logical Operators

Video: JavaScript Operators

Sorry about that.

Our premium learning platform, created with over a decade of experience and thousands of feedbacks .

Learn and improve your coding skills like never before.

• Interactive Courses
• Certificates
• 2000+ Challenges

Specifications

Browser compatibility.

An assignment operator assigns a value to its left operand based on the value of its right operand.

The source for this interactive example is stored in a GitHub repository. If you'd like to contribute to the interactive examples project, please clone https://github.com/mdn/interactive-examples and send us a pull request.

The basic assignment operator is equal ( = ), which assigns the value of its right operand to its left operand. That is, x = y assigns the value of y to x . The other assignment operators are usually shorthand for standard operations, as shown in the following definitions and examples.

Simple assignment operator is used to assign a value to a variable. The assignment operation evaluates to the assigned value. Chaining the assignment operator is possible in order to assign a single value to multiple variables. See the example.

Addition assignment

The addition assignment operator adds the value of the right operand to a variable and assigns the result to the variable. The types of the two operands determine the behavior of the addition assignment operator. Addition or concatenation is possible. See the addition operator for more details.

Subtraction assignment

The subtraction assignment operator subtracts the value of the right operand from a variable and assigns the result to the variable. See the subtraction operator for more details.

Multiplication assignment

The multiplication assignment operator multiplies a variable by the value of the right operand and assigns the result to the variable. See the multiplication operator for more details.

Division assignment

The division assignment operator divides a variable by the value of the right operand and assigns the result to the variable. See the division operator for more details.

Remainder assignment

The remainder assignment operator divides a variable by the value of the right operand and assigns the remainder to the variable. See the remainder operator for more details.

Exponentiation assignment

The exponentiation assignment operator evaluates to the result of raising first operand to the power second operand. See the exponentiation operator for more details.

Left shift assignment

The left shift assignment operator moves the specified amount of bits to the left and assigns the result to the variable. See the left shift operator for more details.

Right shift assignment

The right shift assignment operator moves the specified amount of bits to the right and assigns the result to the variable. See the right shift operator for more details.

Unsigned right shift assignment

The unsigned right shift assignment operator moves the specified amount of bits to the right and assigns the result to the variable. See the unsigned right shift operator for more details.

Bitwise AND assignment

The bitwise AND assignment operator uses the binary representation of both operands, does a bitwise AND operation on them and assigns the result to the variable. See the bitwise AND operator for more details.

Bitwise XOR assignment

The bitwise XOR assignment operator uses the binary representation of both operands, does a bitwise XOR operation on them and assigns the result to the variable. See the bitwise XOR operator for more details.

Bitwise OR assignment

The bitwise OR assignment operator uses the binary representation of both operands, does a bitwise OR operation on them and assigns the result to the variable. See the bitwise OR operator for more details.

Left operand with another assignment operator

In unusual situations, the assignment operator (e.g. x += y ) is not identical to the meaning expression (here x = x + y ). When the left operand of an assignment operator itself contains an assignment operator, the left operand is evaluated only once. For example:

• Arithmetic operators

Document Tags and Contributors

• JavaScript basics
• JavaScript first steps
• JavaScript building blocks
• Introducing JavaScript objects
• Introduction
• Grammar and types
• Control flow and error handling
• Loops and iteration
• Expressions and operators
• Numbers and dates
• Text formatting
• Regular expressions
• Indexed collections
• Keyed collections
• Working with objects
• Details of the object model
• Using promises
• Iterators and generators
• Meta programming
• JavaScript modules
• Client-side web APIs
• A re-introduction to JavaScript
• JavaScript data structures
• Equality comparisons and sameness
• Inheritance and the prototype chain
• Strict mode
• JavaScript typed arrays
• Memory Management
• Concurrency model and Event Loop
• References:
• ArrayBuffer
• AsyncFunction
• Float32Array
• Float64Array
• GeneratorFunction
• InternalError
• Intl.Collator
• Intl.DateTimeFormat
• Intl.ListFormat
• Intl.Locale
• Intl.NumberFormat
• Intl.PluralRules
• Intl.RelativeTimeFormat
• ReferenceError
• SharedArrayBuffer
• SyntaxError
• Uint16Array
• Uint32Array
• Uint8ClampedArray
• WebAssembly
• decodeURI()
• decodeURIComponent()
• encodeURI()
• encodeURIComponent()
• parseFloat()
• Array comprehensions
• Bitwise operators
• Comma operator
• Comparison operators
• Conditional (ternary) operator
• Destructuring assignment
• Expression closures
• Generator comprehensions
• Grouping operator
• Legacy generator function expression
• Logical operators
• Object initializer
• Operator precedence
• (currently at stage 1) pipes the value of an expression into a function. This allows the creation of chained function calls in a readable manner. The result is syntactic sugar in which a function call with a single argument can be written like this:">Pipeline operator
• Property accessors
• Spread syntax
• async function expression
• class expression
• delete operator
• function expression
• function* expression
• in operator
• new operator
• void operator
• Legacy generator function
• async function
• for await...of
• for each...in
• function declaration
• import.meta
• try...catch
• Arrow functions
• Default parameters
• Method definitions
• Rest parameters
• The arguments object
• constructor
• element loaded from a different domain for which you violated the same-origin policy.">Error: Permission denied to access property "x"
• InternalError: too much recursion
• RangeError: argument is not a valid code point
• RangeError: invalid array length
• RangeError: invalid date
• RangeError: precision is out of range
• RangeError: radix must be an integer
• RangeError: repeat count must be less than infinity
• RangeError: repeat count must be non-negative
• ReferenceError: "x" is not defined
• ReferenceError: assignment to undeclared variable "x"
• ReferenceError: can't access lexical declaration`X' before initialization
• ReferenceError: deprecated caller or arguments usage
• ReferenceError: invalid assignment left-hand side
• ReferenceError: reference to undefined property "x"
• SyntaxError: "0"-prefixed octal literals and octal escape seq. are deprecated
• SyntaxError: "use strict" not allowed in function with non-simple parameters
• SyntaxError: "x" is a reserved identifier
• SyntaxError: JSON.parse: bad parsing
• SyntaxError: Malformed formal parameter
• SyntaxError: Unexpected token
• SyntaxError: Using //@ to indicate sourceURL pragmas is deprecated. Use //# instead
• SyntaxError: a declaration in the head of a for-of loop can't have an initializer
• SyntaxError: applying the 'delete' operator to an unqualified name is deprecated
• SyntaxError: for-in loop head declarations may not have initializers
• SyntaxError: function statement requires a name
• SyntaxError: identifier starts immediately after numeric literal
• SyntaxError: illegal character
• SyntaxError: invalid regular expression flag "x"
• SyntaxError: missing ) after argument list
• SyntaxError: missing ) after condition
• SyntaxError: missing : after property id
• SyntaxError: missing ; before statement
• SyntaxError: missing = in const declaration
• SyntaxError: missing ] after element list
• SyntaxError: missing formal parameter
• SyntaxError: missing name after . operator
• SyntaxError: missing variable name
• SyntaxError: missing } after function body
• SyntaxError: missing } after property list
• SyntaxError: redeclaration of formal parameter "x"
• SyntaxError: return not in function
• SyntaxError: test for equality (==) mistyped as assignment (=)?
• SyntaxError: unterminated string literal
• TypeError: "x" has no properties
• TypeError: "x" is (not) "y"
• TypeError: "x" is not a constructor
• TypeError: "x" is not a function
• TypeError: "x" is not a non-null object
• TypeError: "x" is read-only
• TypeError: 'x' is not iterable
• TypeError: More arguments needed
• TypeError: Reduce of empty array with no initial value
• TypeError: can't access dead object
• TypeError: can't access property "x" of "y"
• TypeError: can't assign to property "x" on "y": not an object
• TypeError: can't define property "x": "obj" is not extensible
• TypeError: can't delete non-configurable array element
• TypeError: can't redefine non-configurable property "x"
• TypeError: cannot use 'in' operator to search for 'x' in 'y'
• TypeError: cyclic object value
• TypeError: invalid 'instanceof' operand 'x'
• TypeError: invalid Array.prototype.sort argument
• TypeError: invalid arguments
• TypeError: invalid assignment to const "x"
• TypeError: property "x" is non-configurable and can't be deleted
• TypeError: setting getter-only property "x"
• TypeError: variable "x" redeclares argument
• URIError: malformed URI sequence
• Warning: -file- is being assigned a //# sourceMappingURL, but already has one
• Warning: 08/09 is not a legal ECMA-262 octal constant
• Warning: Date.prototype.toLocaleFormat is deprecated
• Warning: JavaScript 1.6's for-each-in loops are deprecated
• Warning: String.x is deprecated; use String.prototype.x instead
• Warning: expression closures are deprecated
• Warning: unreachable code after return statement
• X.prototype.y called on incompatible type
• JavaScript technologies overview
• Lexical grammar
• Enumerability and ownership of properties
• Iteration protocols
• Transitioning to strict mode
• Template literals
• Deprecated features
• ECMAScript 2015 support in Mozilla
• ECMAScript 5 support in Mozilla
• Firefox JavaScript changelog
• New in JavaScript 1.1
• New in JavaScript 1.2
• New in JavaScript 1.3
• New in JavaScript 1.4
• New in JavaScript 1.5
• New in JavaScript 1.6
• New in JavaScript 1.7
• New in JavaScript 1.8
• New in JavaScript 1.8.1
• New in JavaScript 1.8.5
• Documentation:
• All pages index
• Methods index
• Properties index
• Pages tagged "JavaScript"
• JavaScript doc status
• The MDN project

Learn the best of web development

Get the latest and greatest from MDN delivered straight to your inbox.

Thanks! Please check your inbox to confirm your subscription.

If you haven’t previously confirmed a subscription to a Mozilla-related newsletter you may have to do so. Please check your inbox or your spam filter for an email from us.

Properties in JavaScript: definition versus assignment

Definition versus assignment.

Assignment. To assign to a property, one uses an expression such as

The following two sections go into more detail regarding how definition and assignment work. Feel free to skip them. You should still be able to understand Sect. 4, “The consequences”, and later.

Recap: property attributes and internal properties

Kinds of properties.

• Named accessor properties: A property that exists thanks to a getter or a setter.
• Named data properties: A property that h as a value. Those are the most common properties. They include methods.
• Internal properties: are used internally by JavaScript and not directly accessible via the language. However, there can be indirect ways of accessing them. Example: Every object has an internal property called [[Prototype]]. You cannot directly read it, but still retrieve its value, via Object.getPrototypeOf() . While internal properties are referred to by a name in square brackets, they are nameless in the sense that they are invisible and don’t have a normal, string-valued property name.

Property attributes

• [[Enumerable]]: If a property is non-enumerable, it can’t be seen by some operations, such as for...in and Object.keys() [2] .
• [[Configurable]]: If a property is non-configurable, none of the attributes (except [[Value]]) can be changed via a definition.
• [[Value]]: is the value of the property.
• [[Writable]]: determines whether the value can be changed.
• [[Get]]: holds a getter method.
• [[Set]]: holds a setter method.

Property descriptors

Internal properties

• [[Prototype]]: The prototype of the object.
• [[Extensible]]: Is this object extensible , can new properties be added to it?
• [[DefineOwnProperty]]: Define a property. See explanation below.
• [[Put]]: Assign to a property. See explanation below.

The details of definition and assignment

Defining a property.

[[ DefineOwnProperty ]] (P, Desc, Throw)

• If this does not have an own property whose name is P : Create a new property if the object is extensible, reject if it isn’t.
• Otherwise, there already is an own property and the definition changes that property.
• Converting a data property to an accessor property or vice versa
• Changing [[Configurable]] or [[Enumerable]]
• Changing [[Writable]]
• Changing [[Value]] if [[Writable]] is false
• Changing [[Get]] or [[Set]]
• Otherwise, the existing own property is configurable and can be changed as specified.

Two functions for defining a property are Object.defineProperty and Object.defineProperties . For example:

Assigning to a property

[[ Put ]] (P, Value, Throw)

• If there is a read-only property whose name is P somewhere in the prototype chain: reject.
• If there is a setter whose name is P somewhere in the prototype chain: call the setter.
• If there is no own property whose name is P : if the the object is extensible then create a new property. this.[[DefineOwnProperty]]( P, { value: Value, writable: true, enumerable: true, configurable: true }, Throw ) If the object is not extensible then reject.
• Otherwise, there is an own property named P that is writable. Invoke this.[[DefineOwnProperty]](P, { value: Value }, Throw) That updates the value of P , but keeps its attributes (such as enumerability) unchanged

The consequences

Assignment calls a setter in a prototype, definition creates an own property, read-only properties in prototypes prevent assignment, but not definition.

Definition. With definition, we want to create a new own property:

The assignment operator does not change properties in prototypes

• Methods: Allow methods to be patched, directly in the prototype, but prevent accidental changes via descendants of the prototype.
• Non-method properties: The prototype provides shared default values for descendants. One can override these values via a descendant, but not change them. This is considered an anti-pattern and discouraged. It is cleaner to assign default values in constructors.

Only definition allows you to create a property with arbitrary attributes

The properties of an object literal are added via definition, attributes of methods.

• If you want to create a new property, use definition.
• If you want to change the value of a property, use assignment.
• Prototypes as classes – an introduction to JavaScript inheritance
• JavaScript properties: inheritance and enumerability
• Fixing the Read-only Override Prohibition Mistake [a page on the ECMAScript wiki with background information on this issue]

• DSA with JS - Self Paced
• JS Tutorial
• JS Exercise
• JS Interview Questions
• JS Operator
• JS Projects
• JS Examples
• JS Free JS Course
• JS A to Z Guide
• JS Formatter

Destructuring Assignment in JavaScript

Destructuring Assignment is a JavaScript expression that allows to unpack of values from arrays, or properties from objects, into distinct variables data can be extracted from arrays, objects, and nested objects, and assigned to variables . In Destructuring Assignment on the left-hand side, we define which value should be unpacked from the sourced variable. In general way implementation of the extraction of the array is as shown below: 

Example:  

• Array destructuring:
• Object destructuring:

Array destructuring

Using the Destructuring Assignment in JavaScript array possible situations, all the examples are listed below:

Example 1: When using destructuring assignment the same extraction can be done using below implementations. 

Example 2: The array elements can be skipped as well using a comma separator. A single comma can be used to skip a single array element. One key difference between the spread operator and array destructuring is that the spread operator unpacks all array elements into a comma-separated list which does not allow us to pick or choose which elements we want to assign to variables. To skip the whole array it can be done using the number of commas as there is a number of array elements. 

Example 3: In order to assign some array elements to variable and rest of the array elements to only a single variable can be achieved by using rest operator (…) as in below implementation. But one limitation of rest operator is that it works correctly only with the last elements implying a subarray cannot be obtained leaving the last element in the array. 

Example 4: Values can also be swapped using destructuring assignment as below: 

Example 5: Data can also be extracted from an array returned from a function. One advantage of using a destructuring assignment is that there is no need to manipulate an entire object in a function but just the fields that are required can be copied inside the function. 

Example 6: In ES5 to assign variables from objects its implementation is 

Example 7: The above implementation in ES6 using destructuring assignment is. 

Object destructuring

Example 1: The Nested objects can also be destructured using destructuring syntax. 

Example 2: Nested objects can also be destructuring

Please Login to comment...

Similar reads.

• Web Technologies
• JavaScript-Questions
• How to Get a Free SSL Certificate
• Best SSL Certificates Provider in India
• Elon Musk's xAI releases Grok-2 AI assistant
• What is OpenAI SearchGPT? How it works and How to Get it?
• Content Improvement League 2024: From Good To A Great Article

Improve your Coding Skills with Practice

What kind of Experience do you want to share?

• Stack Overflow for Teams Where developers & technologists share private knowledge with coworkers
• Advertising & Talent Reach devs & technologists worldwide about your product, service or employer brand
• OverflowAI GenAI features for Teams
• OverflowAPI Train & fine-tune LLMs
• Labs The future of collective knowledge sharing
• About the company Visit the blog

Collectives™ on Stack Overflow

Find centralized, trusted content and collaborate around the technologies you use most.

Q&A for work

Connect and share knowledge within a single location that is structured and easy to search.

Get early access and see previews of new features.

How to assign multiple variables at once in JavaScript?

Is there any way to perform multiple assignment in JavaScript like this:

which would be equivalent to this:

• multiple-assignment

• 3 If you want; var a = "one", b = "two"; –  Volkan Yılmaz Commented Jul 16, 2016 at 13:45

5 Answers 5

In ES6 you can do it this way:

The above code is ES6 notation and is called array destructuring/object destructuring (if it's an object).

You provide the array on the right-hand side of the expression and you have comma-separated variables surrounded by square brackets on the left-hand side.

The first variable maps to the first array value and so on.

• please add some more description to it, so that the answer is fully understandable –  webdeb Commented Jul 16, 2016 at 13:50
• 1 If you are unsure about the technical term that you used here, then read and add it in your answer. developer.mozilla.org/en/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/… –  Rajaprabhu Aravindasamy Commented Jul 16, 2016 at 13:51
• Its destructuring we can use array destructuring since we are talking about arrays –  Piyush.kapoor Commented Jul 16, 2016 at 13:54
• var [a, b] = [1,2,3,4,5] –  webdeb Commented Jul 16, 2016 at 13:56
• 2 Will this incur any overhead from constructing the right-side array? Or are interpreters smart enough to have a fast path when the right side is an array literal? –  Will Chen Commented Jul 16, 2021 at 14:51

While you cannot do var a, b = "one", "two"; , and get them assigned to each variable in the respective order, you can do : var a, b; to initialize these variables as undefined .

You can also do var a, b = 'foo'; to assign b to 'foo', while initializing 'a' as undefined .

Object destructuring

looks like:

You will also see this in JavaScript to import members of a module :

Import multiple exports from module. This inserts both foo and bar into the current scope.

If you aren't absolutely married to the idea of the values being at the end of the statement, this works:

If you want to assign to variables that have already been declared, you can use the comma operator to make it a one-liner.

I wanted to extend Ryan's answer - particularly when it comes to for loops. Normally one might write a for loop as:

As many contend, the interpretive nature of JS causes arr.length to be reevaluated on every loop - causing performance loss on large loops (depending on the nature of the upper-bound, e.g., a function ). When performance is paramount, they suggest iterating backward:

However, this approach will cause problems when order is relevant - not to mention being uncommon notation and unclear. To get around this problem, you can construct it thusly:

While not as succinct as a standard loop, it performs better whilest being easier to read than a reverse loop.

No you can not do this way. Javascript doesn't support this type of declaration

• 2 Except that it does . –  nnnnnn Commented Jul 16, 2016 at 13:53
• 3 I seems you live in ice age of JS in ES6 you can use Destructuring Assignment –  Morteza Tourani Commented Jul 16, 2016 at 14:06

Your Answer

Reminder: Answers generated by artificial intelligence tools are not allowed on Stack Overflow. Learn more

Sign up or log in

Post as a guest.

Required, but never shown

By clicking “Post Your Answer”, you agree to our terms of service and acknowledge you have read our privacy policy .

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged javascript multiple-assignment or ask your own question .

• The Overflow Blog
• Where does Postgres fit in a world of GenAI and vector databases?
• Featured on Meta
• We've made changes to our Terms of Service & Privacy Policy - July 2024
• Bringing clarity to status tag usage on meta sites
• Feedback requested: How do you use tag hover descriptions for curating and do...
• What does a new user need in a homepage experience on Stack Overflow?
• Staging Ground Reviewer Motivation

Hot Network Questions

• How could Bangladesh protect itself from Indian dams and barrages?
• Validity of ticket when using alternative train from a different station
• Is "using active record pattern" a reason to inherit from standard container (eg:vector)?
• What's the translation of thought-to-text chip in French?
• What would be non-slang equivalent of "copium"?
• Why is one of the Intel 8042 keyboard controller outputs inverted?
• How is yield calculated for a portfolio?
• What happens if all nine Supreme Justices recuse themselves?
• Is there any video of an air-to-air missile shooting down an aircraft?
• Why are most big lakes in North America aligned?
• How do I safely remove a mystery cast iron pipe in my basement?
• Why does a halfing's racial trait lucky specify you must use the next roll?
• `Drop` for list of elements of different dimensions
• What happens when a helicopter loses the engine and autorotation is not initiated?
• Is there a way to skip frames in beamer?
• CPU is idle, but huge load, and NFS client stop responding
• How much missing data is too much (part 2)? statistical power, effective sample size
• Can a TL431 be configured to output a negative reference voltage?
• Story where character has "boomerdisc"
• My school wants me to download an SSL certificate to connect to WiFi. Can I just avoid doing anything private while on the WiFi?
• Where did Geordi's eyes go?
• Why does Russia strike electric power in Ukraine?
• What is the spiritual difference between hungering and thirsting? (Matthew 5:6)
• Refactoring Enumeration Classes to Use Generics