Difference between as.data.frame(x) and data.frame(x)

Question

What is the difference between as.data.frame(x) and data.frame(x)

In this following example, the result is the same at the exception of the columns names.

Answer 1

As you noted, the result does differ slightly, and this means that they are not exactly equal:

identical(data.frame(x),as.data.frame(x))
[1] FALSE

So you might need to take care to be consistent in which one you use.

But it is also worth noting that as.data.frame is faster:

library(microbenchmark)
microbenchmark(data.frame(x),as.data.frame(x))
Unit: microseconds
             expr    min     lq median      uq     max neval
    data.frame(x) 71.446 73.616  74.80 78.9445 146.442   100
 as.data.frame(x) 25.657 27.631  28.42 29.2100  93.155   100

y <- matrix(1:1e6,1000,1000)
microbenchmark(data.frame(y),as.data.frame(y))
Unit: milliseconds
             expr      min       lq   median       uq       max neval
    data.frame(y) 17.23943 19.63163 23.60193 41.07898 130.66005   100
 as.data.frame(y) 10.83469 12.56357 14.04929 34.68608  38.37435   100