Javascript vs Python - What are the Key Differences?

• You can use JavaScript to create websites and native applications, whereas Python is used in areas such as data analytics,math-intensive operations, and machine learning.
• There are a lot of standard libraries in Python, unlike JavaScript, whose standard library is limited.
• JavaScript can be used both on the server and on the browser, while Python is a language that is mostly used for server-side programming.
• Because JavaScript does not support manipulating raw bytes, JavaScript should be encoded as UTF-16, whereas by default Python code is encoded as ASCII (American Standard Code for Information Interchange) unless you specify a different encoding format.
• The Python programming language has numerical data types, like fixed-point decimal, int, and float, on the other hand, Java-Script has only floating-point variables.
• Python uses a class-based model for inheritance whereas JavaScript uses a prototype-based model for inheritance.
• JavaScript uses "this" to access the object whereas Python has Self-argument for each method as a first argument.
• In JavaScript ";" is used as a statement terminator whereas newline is used in Python.

Benefits of JavaScript

The benefits of JavaScript are as follows:-

• Speed and Server load - JavaScript is always executed on the client-side which saves a lot of bandwidth and increases the execution speed along with reducing the server load. Also, Javascript is not restricted by the network calls to the server.
• Compatibility - JavaScript can be used in different applications made using languages like PHP and Perl as JavaScript is a browser-based language.
• Updates - ECMA International updates the JavaScript with the new features with each update.
• Versatility - JavaScript can be used in many ways like in Frontend as React, Angular, Vue framework in the backend as Node.js, and Express.js for managing routes and servers.
• Simplicity - JavaScript is simple to learn syntax-wise as compared to other programming languages like C++.
• Popularity - There are many Open-source contributing communities for JavaScript also many Big giants support JavaScript by developing projects based on JavaScript. Example - React.js is made by Facebook and Angular.js by Google.

Benefits of Python

The benefits of Python are as follows :-

• Easy to Learn - Python is a good programming language to start for beginners and non-programmers.
• Libraries and Less Coding - One of the benefits of using Python is, that there are vast libraries you can integrate into your code for free. You can perform the same task in a single line of code in Python using Libraries compared to other languages like C++, JAVA, and JavaScript.
• Versatility - Python is used in areas such as data analytics,math-intensive operations, and machine learning where the python libraries like Pandas, Numpy, and Matplotlib are used.
• Popularity - Certainly Python has one of the largest communities of engineers and developers who constantly build libraries and contribute to the programming language.
• Dynamically typed - Python is a dynamically typed language, as it is not necessary to declare variable of a particular type, the variable type is determined during runtime only and the type of variable can be changed even after being set.

Examples for javascript vs python

Both JavaScript and Python have their syntax for writing the code. let's have a look at the basic practices in both languages.

1. Code Blocks

The code block is the basic structure of programming language that defines how the code should be written.

• Python Code Blocks

Python uses indentation for the definition of code blocks. When the indentation continues in a series with respect to the previous line of code, the code belongs to the same block. In the above image, the yellow block is indentation.

• JavaScript Code Blocks

JavaScript uses curly braces {} for grouping the code of the same block. In the above image, the curly braces are denoted using yellow circles.

2. Variable Defination

The assignment operator is used to define the variables and assign the values in both programming languages.

• Variable Defination in Python

Variables in Python are defined using the variable name and assigning it to any value. As we already learned that Python has dynamic variables we don't need to mention the data type of the variable.

• Variable Defination in JavaScript

The syntax for defining a variable is similar to Python but we need to add the var keyword before the variable name and the semicolon ; after the value. You can also use let instead of var.

3. Comments

To write readable and clean code we must comment on our code. In both the programming languages we have different styles of writing the comments.

• Comments in Python

To write comments in python we use the hashtag #. But please note all the characters of the comment should be on the same line. To write multiple line comments you can make use of # on the multiple lines.

Example -

• Comments in JavaScript

To write comments in JavaScript we use slashes //. But please note all the characters of the comment should be on the same line. To write multiple-line comments you can make use of /* */.

Example -

4. Data Types

Let's have a look at the data types in Python and JavaScript.

• Data Types in JavaScript.

In JavaScript we have 6 primitive data types which include Boolean, undefined, String, BigInt, Number and Symbol.

If we talk about numeric data types in JavaScript we have two numeric data types BigInt and Number. Here Number includes floating-point variables and integers whereas BigInt includes the whole numbers bigger than 25 to the power 3 -1.

In JavaScript to denote the absence of any value, we use null.

In JavaScript, we can declare an undefined variable without assigning it an initial value. As we can see below the variable x is not assigned any value and hence it is automatically assigned an undefined value.

Example -

• Data Types in Python.

In Python we have 4 primitive datatypes which include Boolean denoted as bool, Integers denoted as int, Strings denoted as str, and float.

In contrast, Python has three numeric data types which include integers denoted as int, floating-point variables denoted as float, and complex.

In Python to denote a absense of any value we use none.

In Python, we cannot declare a variable without assigning it a value. you cannot keep the variable undefined instead you can assign it with none.

Table of Differences - JavaScript vs Python

Learn more Cmportant Concepts in Javascript

• Important concepts in JavaScript