How to sort an array based on the length of each element?

We can use Array.sort method to sort this array.

ES5 solution

var array = ["ab", "abcdefgh", "abcd"];

array.sort(function(a, b){return b.length - a.length});

console.log(JSON.stringify(array, null, '\t'));

For ascending sort order: a.length - b.length

For descending sort order: b.length - a.length

ES6 solution

Attention: not all browsers can understand ES6 code!

In ES6 we can use an arrow function expressions.

let array = ["ab", "abcdefgh", "abcd"];

array.sort((a, b) => b.length - a.length);

console.log(JSON.stringify(array, null, '\t'));

With modern JavaScript you can do like this:

Descending order

const arr = [
  "ab",
  "abcdefgh",
  "abcd",
  "abcdefghijklm"
];

arr.sort((a, b) => b.length - a.length);

console.log(JSON.stringify(arr, null, 2));

Ascending Order - Just switch the a with b

const arr = [
  "ab",
  "abcdefgh",
  "abcd",
  "abcdefghijklm"
];

arr.sort((a, b) => a.length - b.length);

console.log(JSON.stringify(arr, null, 2));

Here is the sort, depending on the length of a string with javascript using Bubble sort as you asked:

var arr = ['1234', '12', '12345', '1'];

bubbleSort(arr );

function bubbleSort(a) {
    var swapped;
    do {
        swapped = false;
        for (var i = 0; i < a.length - 1; i++) {
            if (a[i].length < a[i + 1].length) {
                var temp = a[i];
                a[i] = a[i + 1];
                a[i + 1] = temp;
                swapped = true;
            }
        }
    } while (swapped);
}

console.log(arr );

#created a sorting function to sort by length of elements of list
def sort_len(a):
    num = len(a)
    d = {}
    i = 0
    while i<num:
        d[i] = len(a[i])
        i += 1
    b = list(d.values())
    b.sort()
    c = []
    for i in b:
        for j in range(num):
            if j in list(d.keys()):
                if d[j] == i:
                    c.append(a[j])
                    d.pop(j)
    return c

If you want to preserve the order of the element with the same length as the original array, use bubble sort.

Input = ["ab","cdc","abcd","de"];

Output  = ["ab","cd","cdc","abcd"]

Function:

function bubbleSort(strArray){
  const arrayLength = Object.keys(strArray).length;
    var swapp;
    var newLen = arrayLength-1;
    var sortedStrArrByLenght=strArray;
    do {
        swapp = false;
        for (var i=0; i < newLen; i++)
        {
            if (sortedStrArrByLenght[i].length > sortedStrArrByLenght[i+1].length)
            {
               var temp = sortedStrArrByLenght[i];
               sortedStrArrByLenght[i] = sortedStrArrByLenght[i+1];
               sortedStrArrByLenght[i+1] = temp;
               swapp = true;
            }
        }
        newLen--;
    } while (swap);
  return sortedStrArrByLenght;
}

let arr  = [5,2,100,1,20,3];
arr.sort((a,b)=>{
  return a-b 
})

console.log(arr) //[1, 2, 3, 5, 20, 100]

on the return value, the sort method will perform the functionality of swapping of an elements

return < 0  { i.e -ve number then  a comes before b}
return > 0  { i.e +ve number then  b comes before a}
return == 0 { order of a and b remains same }

Based on Salman's answer, I've written a small function to encapsulate it:

function sortArrayByLength(arr, ascYN) {
        arr.sort(function (a, b) {           // sort array by length of text
            if (ascYN) return a.length - b.length;              // ASC -> a - b
            else return b.length - a.length;                    // DESC -> b - a
        });
    }

then just call it with

sortArrayByLength( myArray, true );

Note that unfortunately, functions can/should not be added to the Array prototype, as explained on this page.

Also, it modified the array passed as a parameter and doesn't return anything. This would force the duplication of the array and wouldn't be great for large arrays. If someone has a better idea, please do comment!

I adapted @shareef's answer to make it concise. I use,

.sort(function(arg1, arg2) { return arg1.length - arg2.length })

This code should do the trick:

var array = ["ab", "abcdefgh", "abcd"];

array.sort(function(a, b){return b.length - a.length});

console.log(JSON.stringify(array, null, '\t'));

let array = [`ab`, `abcdefgh`, `abcd`];
let newArray = array.sort((a,b) => {
    return b.length - a.length
})
console.log(newArray);

Please the following code