Simple snippet to shuffle array

Simple snippet to shuffle array

If you need to shuffle the elements of an array, you can use this simple function:

function shuffle(array) {
  const copy = [...array]

  return copy.sort(() => Math.random() - 0.5)
}

The algorithm

  1. Creates a copy of the parameter to not modify the original array
  2. Uses the function Array.prototype.sort of the copy to randomly sort the array with a callback that always returns Math.random() - 0.5 (The random factor).

Example

const example = [1, 2, 3]

const shuffled = shuffle(example)

/*
  shuffled is one of these:
  - [1, 2, 3]
  - [1, 3, 2]
  - [2, 1, 3]
  - [2, 3, 1]
  - [3, 1, 2]
  - [3, 2, 1]
*/