Set.prototype.intersection()

Baseline 2024

Newly available

Since June 2024, this feature works across the latest devices and browser versions. This feature might not work in older devices or browsers.

The intersection() method of Set instances takes a set and returns a new set containing elements in both this set and the given set.

Syntax

js
intersection(other)

Parameters

other

A Set object, or set-like object.

Return value

A new Set object containing elements in both this set and the other set.

Description

In mathematical notation, intersection is defined as:

AB={xAxB}A\cap B = \{x\in A\mid x\in B\}

And using Venn diagram:

A Venn diagram where two circles overlap. The intersection of A and B is the part where they overlap.

intersection() accepts set-like objects as the other parameter. It requires this to be an actual Set instance, because it directly retrieves the underlying data stored in this without invoking any user code. Then, its behavior depends on the sizes of this and other:

  • If there are more elements in this than other.size, then it iterates over other by calling its keys() method, and constructs a new set with all elements produced that are also present in this.
  • Otherwise, it iterates over the elements in this, and constructs a new set with all elements e in this that cause other.has(e) to return a truthy value.

Because of this implementation, the efficiency of intersection() mostly depends on the size of the smaller set between this and other (assuming sets can be accessed in sublinear time). The order of elements in the returned set is the same as that of the smaller of this and other.

Examples

Using intersection()

The following example computes the intersection between the set of odd numbers (<10) and the set of perfect squares (<10). The result is the set of odd numbers that are perfect squares.

js
const odds = new Set([1, 3, 5, 7, 9]);
const squares = new Set([1, 4, 9]);
console.log(odds.intersection(squares)); // Set(2) { 1, 9 }

Specifications

Specification
Set methods
# sec-set.prototype.intersection

Browser compatibility

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See also