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Emscripten VS WebAssembly

Compare Emscripten VS WebAssembly and see what are their differences

Emscripten logo Emscripten

Emscripten is an LLVM to JavaScript compiler.

WebAssembly logo WebAssembly

Application and Data, Languages & Frameworks, and Languages
  • Emscripten Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-08-02
  • WebAssembly Landing page
    Landing page //
    2021-08-27

Emscripten features and specs

  • Cross-platform compatibility
    Emscripten enables developers to compile C and C++ code to WebAssembly or JavaScript, allowing the same codebase to run on multiple platforms, such as browsers and node.js, without needing additional platform-specific adaptations.
  • Leverage existing libraries
    Developers can utilize a vast ecosystem of existing C and C++ libraries by compiling them for the web, saving time and resources required for rewriting or finding alternatives developed in JavaScript.
  • Performance optimization
    Emscripten's compilation to WebAssembly provides near-native performance for web applications, making it suitable for compute-intensive tasks like gaming, simulations, and data processing.
  • Familiar toolchain
    Developers can use familiar tools like CMake and others as part of their Emscripten workflow, making it easier for those with C/C++ backgrounds to adapt and integrate into their web development processes.

Possible disadvantages of Emscripten

  • Steep learning curve
    Developers unfamiliar with C and C++ may find Emscripten challenging to use effectively, as it requires knowledge of these languages and their build systems to create and debug applications.
  • Limitations in browser environments
    Certain features of C/C++ may not translate directly to web environments due to browser sandboxing constraints, leading to potential issues with file I/O, threading, and other system-level operations.
  • Code size
    Compiled WebAssembly and JavaScript code can sometimes be large, potentially affecting load times and performance, especially on lower-end devices with restrictive bandwidth or processing capabilities.
  • Debugging complexity
    Debugging WebAssembly code can be more complex than traditional JavaScript, requiring specialized tooling and techniques to trace and fix issues effectively.

WebAssembly features and specs

No features have been listed yet.

Emscripten videos

Monster Madness Online (Emscripten Web Technology Overview)

WebAssembly videos

WebAssembly / Blazor Are The Future Of Web Development...DONT MISS OUT!

More videos:

  • Review - New Blazor WebAssembly capabilities in .NET 6

Category Popularity

0-100% (relative to Emscripten and WebAssembly)
IDE
74 74%
26% 26
Email Marketing
85 85%
15% 15
Project Management
59 59%
41% 41
Text Editors
70 70%
30% 30

User comments

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Social recommendations and mentions

Based on our record, Emscripten seems to be more popular. It has been mentiond 47 times since March 2021. We are tracking product recommendations and mentions on various public social media platforms and blogs. They can help you identify which product is more popular and what people think of it.

Emscripten mentions (47)

  • Ask HN: Qt style "Signals and Slots" based JavaScript UI library?
    The first thing that comes to mind is that Qt now has a WebAssembly port[1] using Emscripten[2], so depending on your use-case, you could possibly just run Qt on the Web platform and avoid the need for a JavaScript framework entirely. [1]: https://doc.qt.io/qt-5/wasm.html [2]: https://emscripten.org. - Source: Hacker News / 16 days ago
  • Ask HN: Resources for Learning Graphics Programming
    Me and a friend build our own Graphics engines based on https://learnopengl.com I can highly recommend this to everyone who gets started with computer graphics. It is a lot of new information but not the most modern Graphics library, but the information will help you understand the field and pickup any other graphics library quicker. Once I had a small project up and running I started looking at... - Source: Hacker News / 8 months ago
  • Software Applications Incorporated
    Https://infinitemac.org, which is https://basilisk.cebix.net compiled for the web using https://emscripten.org. - Source: Hacker News / over 1 year ago
  • How does one get started with unit testing?
    One place that I’ve found some real, open source unit tests to look at for an example is in the emsdk for emscripten: https://emscripten.org. Source: over 1 year ago
  • Playing with low-level memory in WebAssembly
    I am playing around with Emscipten which wraps around clang to compile C/C++ code in WASM binary and provide some glue-code API to embed WASM binary into JavaScript. Look into MDN Docs and Emscripten SDK to get started. - Source: dev.to / over 1 year ago
View more

WebAssembly mentions (0)

We have not tracked any mentions of WebAssembly yet. Tracking of WebAssembly recommendations started around Mar 2021.

What are some alternatives?

When comparing Emscripten and WebAssembly, you can also consider the following products

GNU Compiler Collection - The GNU Compiler Collection (GCC) is a compiler system produced by the GNU Project supporting...

Cheerp - Enterprise-grade C/C++ compiler for Web applications. Compiles to WASM/JavaScript

Portable C Compiler - pcc is a C99 compiler which aims to be small, simple, fast and understandable.

LLVM - LLVM is a compiler infrastructure designed for compile-time, link-time, run-time, and...

ACE (Ajax Code Editor) - Focused and built towards coders, web designers, and web builders, ACE (Ajax Code Editor) can help...

Tiny C Compiler - The Tiny C Compiler is an x86, x86-64 and ARM processor C compiler created by Fabrice Bellard.