Introduction
JavaScript has a variety of operators that can be used to perform operations on variables and values. The most common operators are arithmetic operators, which are used to perform mathematical operations on numbers. Other operators include the assignment operator, which assigns a value to a variable, and the comparison operator, which compares two values.
One of the different comparison operators is the less than equal to operator (>=
) operator. In this article, we will discuss how to use the less than or equal to operator in JavaScript
The less than or equal to operator in JavaScript
The less than or equal to operator (<=) compares the values of two operands and returns true if the first operand is less than or equal to the second operand. Otherwise, it returns false.
Comparison operators including less than or equal to operators can be used to compare numbers, strings, or even objects.
Let’s illustrate the behavior of the operator using different examples.
String Comparison
For string comparison, the alphabet characters from A
to Z
occurs in ascending order, and so Z
is greater than A
. In the example below, the "Big"
is less than "Cat"
and vice versa.
console.log("Big" <= "Cat");
console.log("Cat" <= "Big");
Output
true
false
Number Comparison
The typical numerical order applies with the less than or equal to operator.
console.log(5 <= 3);
console.log(3 <= 5);
Output
false
true
String and Number Comparison
In cases where we are comparing strings and numbers using the less than or equal to operator, type coercion is triggered on the string, and so if the string contains numbers, number comparisons are executed.
console.log("3" <= 5);
console.log(5 <= "3");
console.log("Java" <= 4);
Output
true
false
false
Summary
In summary, the less than or equal operator can be used on numbers and strings to find which values are lesser or equal.
References
Less than or equal (<=) - JavaScript | MDN (mozilla.org)
Type coercion - MDN Web Docs Glossary: Definitions of Web-related terms | MDN (mozilla.org)