Math.hypot() -> Small convenience for finding euclidean distance

Question

Discovered something interesting while solving a collision detection related JS problem, most of the time its usual to find distance between two points with this approach

const dx = x2 - x1;
const dy = y2 - y1;
const distance = Math.sqrt(dx * dx + dy * dy) 

// An interesting way to achieve this in JS with much readable and efficient way is

const distance = Math.hypot(x2-x1 , y2 - y1); 

// also 3d distances

const distance3d = Math.hypot(x2-x1, y2 - y1, z2 - z1);

Why use Math.hypot ?

✔ Cleaner & more readable

✔ Handles more than 2D (supports n-dimensions)

✔ Avoids overflow/underflow issues: It internally optimizes calculations to prevent floating-point precision errors. Although these will be pretty rare in day-to-day coding flows

Should You Use Math.hypot?

If you care about readability and correctness, yes!

If you're working on performance-sensitive code (games, physics, etc.), manually squaring values can be faster.

But most regular devs don't even know it exists—so using it might make you look like a wizard. ♂️

Comments

Great breakdown of Math.hypot()! Never realized it helps with floating-point precision issues—super useful. Do you think there's any real-world case where the performance hit would be noticeable, or is it mostly negligible outside of high-performance apps? Also, props for sharing the 3D example, that's a neat bonus!