Array.prototype.copyWithin()
BaselineWidely available
This feature is well established and works across many devices and browser versions. It’s been available across browsers since September 2015.
ThecopyWithin()
method ofArray
instances shallow copies part of this array to another location in the same array and returns this array without modifying its length.
Try it
const array1 = ["a", "b", "c", "d", "e"];// Copy to index 0 the element at index 3console.log(array1.copyWithin(0, 3, 4));// Expected output: Array ["d", "b", "c", "d", "e"]// Copy to index 1 all elements from index 3 to the endconsole.log(array1.copyWithin(1, 3));// Expected output: Array ["d", "d", "e", "d", "e"]
Syntax
copyWithin(target, start)copyWithin(target, start, end)
Parameters
target
Zero-based index at which to copy the sequence to,converted to an integer. This corresponds to where the element at
start
will be copied to, and all elements betweenstart
andend
are copied to succeeding indices.- Negative index counts back from the end of the array — if
-array.length <= target < 0
,target + array.length
is used. - If
target < -array.length
,0
is used. - If
target >= array.length
, nothing is copied. - If
target
is positioned afterstart
after normalization, copying only happens until the end ofarray.length
(in other words,copyWithin()
never extends the array).
- Negative index counts back from the end of the array — if
start
Zero-based index at which to start copying elements from,converted to an integer.
- Negative index counts back from the end of the array — if
-array.length <= start < 0
,start + array.length
is used. - If
start < -array.length
,0
is used. - If
start >= array.length
, nothing is copied.
- Negative index counts back from the end of the array — if
end
OptionalZero-based index at which to end copying elements from,converted to an integer.
copyWithin()
copies up to but not includingend
.- Negative index counts back from the end of the array — if
-array.length <= end < 0
,end + array.length
is used. - If
end < -array.length
,0
is used. - If
end >= array.length
orend
is omitted orundefined
,array.length
is used, causing all elements until the end to be copied. - If
end
implies a position before or at the position thatstart
implies, nothing is copied.
- Negative index counts back from the end of the array — if
Return value
The modified array.
Description
ThecopyWithin()
method works like C and C++'smemmove
, and is a high-performance method to shift the data of anArray
. This especially applies to theTypedArray
method of the same name. The sequence is copied and pasted as one operation; the pasted sequence will have the copied values even when the copy and paste region overlap.
Becauseundefined
becomes0
when converted to an integer, omitting thestart
parameter has the same effect as passing0
, which copies the entire array to the target position, equivalent to a right shift where the right boundary is clipped off and the left boundary is duplicated. This behavior may confuse readers of your code, so you should explicitly pass0
asstart
instead.
console.log([1, 2, 3, 4, 5].copyWithin(2));// [1, 2, 1, 2, 3]; move all elements to the right by 2 positions
ThecopyWithin()
method is amutating method. It does not alter the length ofthis
, but it will change the content ofthis
and create new properties or delete existing properties, if necessary.
ThecopyWithin()
method preserves empty slots. If the region to be copied from issparse, the empty slots' corresponding new indices aredeleted and also become empty slots.
ThecopyWithin()
method isgeneric. It only expects thethis
value to have alength
property and integer-keyed properties. Although strings are also array-like, this method is not suitable to be applied on them, as strings are immutable.
Examples
Using copyWithin()
console.log([1, 2, 3, 4, 5].copyWithin(0, 3));// [4, 5, 3, 4, 5]console.log([1, 2, 3, 4, 5].copyWithin(0, 3, 4));// [4, 2, 3, 4, 5]console.log([1, 2, 3, 4, 5].copyWithin(-2, -3, -1));// [1, 2, 3, 3, 4]
Using copyWithin() on sparse arrays
copyWithin()
will propagate empty slots.
console.log([1, , 3].copyWithin(2, 1, 2)); // [1, empty, empty]
Calling copyWithin() on non-array objects
ThecopyWithin()
method reads thelength
property ofthis
and then manipulates the integer indices involved.
const arrayLike = { length: 5, 3: 1,};console.log(Array.prototype.copyWithin.call(arrayLike, 0, 3));// { '0': 1, '3': 1, length: 5 }console.log(Array.prototype.copyWithin.call(arrayLike, 3, 1));// { '0': 1, length: 5 }// The '3' property is deleted because the copied source is an empty slot
Specifications
Specification |
---|
ECMAScript® 2026 Language Specification # sec-array.prototype.copywithin |