performance-now vs web-vitals vs perf_hooks
Performance Measurement Libraries Comparison
1 Year
performance-nowweb-vitalsperf_hooksSimilar Packages:
What's Performance Measurement Libraries?

These libraries provide tools for measuring and analyzing the performance of web applications. They help developers understand how their applications are performing in terms of speed, efficiency, and user experience. By utilizing these packages, developers can identify bottlenecks, optimize resource usage, and enhance overall performance, leading to a smoother and faster user experience.

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performance-now32,058,1940-28 years agoMIT
web-vitals7,843,3158,073378 kB1820 days agoApache-2.0
perf_hooks196,33411-08 years agoMIT
Feature Comparison: performance-now vs web-vitals vs perf_hooks

Performance Measurement

  • performance-now:

    performance-now offers a simple way to get high-resolution timestamps in JavaScript. It is designed to be lightweight and fast, making it ideal for measuring the duration of code execution. The library provides a single function that returns the current time in milliseconds with sub-millisecond precision, which is useful for benchmarking and profiling code performance.

  • web-vitals:

    web-vitals focuses on measuring the most important aspects of user experience in web applications. It tracks metrics that directly impact user satisfaction, such as loading performance, interactivity, and visual stability. By providing a straightforward API to collect and report these metrics, it enables developers to gain insights into how their applications perform in real-world scenarios.

  • perf_hooks:

    perf_hooks provides a set of APIs to measure performance in Node.js applications. It allows developers to create performance timers, measure execution time of specific code blocks, and gather performance metrics that are crucial for optimizing server-side applications. The high-resolution timers can measure time in nanoseconds, making it suitable for detailed performance analysis.

Use Case

  • performance-now:

    performance-now is particularly useful in scenarios where you need to measure the performance of specific functions or code segments in a web application. It is often used in benchmarking tests or performance profiling during development to identify slow-running code paths and optimize them effectively.

  • web-vitals:

    web-vitals is designed for front-end applications that aim to enhance user experience. It is particularly useful for web developers looking to improve their site's performance metrics as perceived by users. By focusing on metrics that matter to users, it helps in making informed decisions to enhance site speed and responsiveness.

  • perf_hooks:

    perf_hooks is best suited for server-side applications where performance monitoring is critical. It is ideal for applications that require detailed performance profiling and optimization, such as APIs and microservices, where understanding execution time can lead to significant improvements in response times and resource management.

Integration

  • performance-now:

    performance-now is a standalone library that can be easily integrated into any JavaScript project. It requires no additional setup and can be used immediately to measure performance, making it a convenient choice for developers looking for a quick solution to timing issues.

  • web-vitals:

    web-vitals is designed to be easily integrated into existing web applications. It can be added with minimal configuration and works well with popular frameworks like React and Angular. The library can report metrics to analytics services, making it easy to track performance over time.

  • perf_hooks:

    perf_hooks is integrated into the Node.js runtime, making it easy to use without additional dependencies. It leverages the existing performance monitoring capabilities of Node.js, allowing developers to seamlessly incorporate performance measurement into their applications with minimal setup.

Accuracy

  • performance-now:

    performance-now offers high-resolution timestamps with millisecond precision, which is sufficient for most performance measurement needs in web applications. While it may not be as precise as perf_hooks, it strikes a balance between simplicity and accuracy for typical use cases.

  • web-vitals:

    web-vitals focuses on measuring user-centric performance metrics that reflect real-world experiences. While it may not provide the same level of granularity as perf_hooks, it emphasizes the metrics that matter most to users, ensuring that developers can prioritize improvements that enhance user satisfaction.

  • perf_hooks:

    perf_hooks provides high-accuracy performance measurements with nanosecond precision, making it suitable for applications that require detailed performance profiling. This level of accuracy is essential for identifying performance bottlenecks in complex server-side applications.

Community Support

  • performance-now:

    performance-now is a widely used library with a strong community backing. It has been around for a while and is well-documented, making it easy for developers to find help and examples for performance measurement in their projects.

  • web-vitals:

    web-vitals is backed by Google and has gained significant traction in the web development community. It is actively maintained and updated, with a growing number of resources available for developers to learn how to implement and utilize the library effectively.

  • perf_hooks:

    perf_hooks benefits from the extensive Node.js community, which provides a wealth of resources, tutorials, and best practices for performance monitoring in server-side applications. This support can be invaluable for developers looking to optimize their Node.js applications effectively.

How to Choose: performance-now vs web-vitals vs perf_hooks
  • performance-now:

    Select performance-now for browser-based applications where you need a simple and lightweight solution for high-resolution timestamps. It is particularly useful for measuring time intervals in JavaScript code execution, providing a straightforward API for performance measurement without the overhead of a larger library.

  • web-vitals:

    Opt for web-vitals if you want to measure the real-world performance of your web applications as experienced by users. This library focuses on key performance metrics such as First Contentful Paint (FCP), Largest Contentful Paint (LCP), and Cumulative Layout Shift (CLS), providing insights into user experience and helping to improve SEO.

  • perf_hooks:

    Choose perf_hooks if you are working in a Node.js environment and need high-resolution performance measurements. It provides built-in performance monitoring capabilities that are integrated into the Node.js runtime, allowing for precise tracking of performance metrics across your application.

README for performance-now

performance-now Build Status Dependency Status

Implements a function similar to performance.now (based on process.hrtime).

Modern browsers have a window.performance object with - among others - a now method which gives time in milliseconds, but with sub-millisecond precision. This module offers the same function based on the Node.js native process.hrtime function.

Using process.hrtime means that the reported time will be monotonically increasing, and not subject to clock-drift.

According to the High Resolution Time specification, the number of milliseconds reported by performance.now should be relative to the value of performance.timing.navigationStart.

In the current version of the module (2.0) the reported time is relative to the time the current Node process has started (inferred from process.uptime()).

Version 1.0 reported a different time. The reported time was relative to the time the module was loaded (i.e. the time it was first required). If you need this functionality, version 1.0 is still available on NPM.

Example usage

var now = require("performance-now")
var start = now()
var end = now()
console.log(start.toFixed(3)) // the number of milliseconds the current node process is running
console.log((start-end).toFixed(3)) // ~ 0.002 on my system

Running the now function two times right after each other yields a time difference of a few microseconds. Given this overhead, I think it's best to assume that the precision of intervals computed with this method is not higher than 10 microseconds, if you don't know the exact overhead on your own system.

License

performance-now is released under the MIT License. Copyright (c) 2017 Braveg1rl