Are list-comprehensions and functional functions faster than “for loops”?

Question

In terms of performance in Python, is a list-comprehension, or functions like map(), filter() and reduce() faster than a for loop? Why

Answer 1

I modified @Alisa's code and used cProfile to show why list comprehension is faster:

from functools import reduce
import datetime

def reduce_(numbers):
    return reduce(lambda sum, next: sum + next * next, numbers, 0)

def for_loop(numbers):
    a = []
    for i in numbers:
        a.append(i*2)
    a = sum(a)
    return a

def map_(numbers):
    sqrt = lambda x: x*x
    return sum(map(sqrt, numbers))

def list_comp(numbers):
    return(sum([i*i for i in numbers]))

funcs = [
        reduce_,
        for_loop,
        map_,
        list_comp
        ]

if __name__ == "__main__":
    # [1, 2, 5, 3, 1, 2, 5, 3]
    import cProfile
    for f in funcs:
        print('=' * 25)
        print("Profiling:", f.__name__)
        print('=' * 25)
        pr = cProfile.Profile()
        for i in range(10**6):
            pr.runcall(f, [1, 2, 5, 3, 1, 2, 5, 3])
        pr.create_stats()
        pr.print_stats()

Here's the results:

=========================
Profiling: reduce_
=========================
         11000000 function calls in 1.501 seconds

   Ordered by: standard name

   ncalls  tottime  percall  cumtime  percall filename:lineno(function)
  1000000    0.162    0.000    1.473    0.000 profiling.py:4(reduce_)
  8000000    0.461    0.000    0.461    0.000 profiling.py:5()
  1000000    0.850    0.000    1.311    0.000 {built-in method _functools.reduce}
  1000000    0.028    0.000    0.028    0.000 {method 'disable' of '_lsprof.Profiler' objects}


=========================
Profiling: for_loop
=========================
         11000000 function calls in 1.372 seconds

   Ordered by: standard name

   ncalls  tottime  percall  cumtime  percall filename:lineno(function)
  1000000    0.879    0.000    1.344    0.000 profiling.py:7(for_loop)
  1000000    0.145    0.000    0.145    0.000 {built-in method builtins.sum}
  8000000    0.320    0.000    0.320    0.000 {method 'append' of 'list' objects}
  1000000    0.027    0.000    0.027    0.000 {method 'disable' of '_lsprof.Profiler' objects}


=========================
Profiling: map_
=========================
         11000000 function calls in 1.470 seconds

   Ordered by: standard name

   ncalls  tottime  percall  cumtime  percall filename:lineno(function)
  1000000    0.264    0.000    1.442    0.000 profiling.py:14(map_)
  8000000    0.387    0.000    0.387    0.000 profiling.py:15()
  1000000    0.791    0.000    1.178    0.000 {built-in method builtins.sum}
  1000000    0.028    0.000    0.028    0.000 {method 'disable' of '_lsprof.Profiler' objects}


=========================
Profiling: list_comp
=========================
         4000000 function calls in 0.737 seconds

   Ordered by: standard name

   ncalls  tottime  percall  cumtime  percall filename:lineno(function)
  1000000    0.318    0.000    0.709    0.000 profiling.py:18(list_comp)
  1000000    0.261    0.000    0.261    0.000 profiling.py:19()
  1000000    0.131    0.000    0.131    0.000 {built-in method builtins.sum}
  1000000    0.027    0.000    0.027    0.000 {method 'disable' of '_lsprof.Profiler' objects}

IMHO:

• reduce and map are in general pretty slow. Not only that, using sum on the iterators that map returned is slow, compared to suming a list
• for_loop uses append, which is of course slow to some extent
• list-comprehension not only spent the least time building the list, it also makes sum much quicker, in contrast to map