JavaScript has the primitive data types:

1. null
2. undefined
3. boolean
4. number
5. string
6. symbol – available from ES2015
7. bigint – available from ES2020

and a complex data-type object.

JavaScript is a dynamically typed language. It means that a variable doesn’t associate with a type. In other words, a variable can hold a value of different types. For example:

let counter = 120;// counter is a number
counter = false;// counter is now a boolean
counter = "foo";// counter is now a string

To get the current type of the value that the variable stores, you use the typeof operator:

let counter = 120;
console.log(typeof(counter));// "number"

counter = false;
console.log(typeof(counter));// "boolean"

counter = "Hi";
console.log(typeof(counter));// "string"

Output:

"number"
"boolean"
"string"

The undefined type

The undefined type is a primitive type that has only one value undefined. By default, when a variable is declared but not initialized, it is assigned the value of undefined.

Consider the following example:

let counter;
console.log(counter);
// undefinedconsole.log(typeof counter);// undefined

In this example, the counter is a variable. Since the counter hasn’t been initialized, it is assigned the value undefined. The type of counter is also undefined.

It’s important to note that the typeof operator also returns undefined when you call it on a variable that hasn’t been declared:

console.log(typeof undeclaredVar);
// undefined

The null type

The null type is the second primitive data type that also has only one value null. For example:

let obj = null;
console.log(typeof obj);
// object

The typeof null returns object is a known bug in JavaScript. A proposal to fix this was proposed but rejected. The reason was the that fix would break a lot of existing sites.

JavaScript defines that null is equal to undefined as follows:

console.log(null == undefined);
// true

The number type

JavaScript uses the number type to represent both integer and floating-point numbers.

The following statement declares a variable and initializes its value with an integer:

let num = 100;

To represent a floating-point number, you include a decimal point followed by at least one number. For example:

let price= 12.5;
let discount = 0.05;

Note that JavaScript automatically converts a floating-point number into an integer number if the number appears to be a whole number.

The reason is that Javascript always wants to use less memory since a floating-point value uses twice as much memory as an integer value. For example:

let price = 200.00;
// interpreted as an integer 200

To get the range of the number type, you use Number.MIN_VALUE and Number.MAX_VALUE. For example:

console.log(Number.MAX_VALUE);
// 1.7976931348623157e+308
console.log(Number.MIN_VALUE);
// 5e-324

Also, you can use Infinity and -Infinity to represent the infinite number. For example:

console.log(Number.MAX_VALUE + Number.MAX_VALUE);
// Infinity
console.log(-Number.MAX_VALUE - Number.MAX_VALUE);
// -Infinity

NaN

NaN stands for Not a Number. It is a special numeric value that indicates an invalid number. For example, the division of a string by a number returns NaN:.

console.log('a'/2);
// NaN;

The NaN has two special characteristics:

• Any operation with NaN returns NaN.
• The NaN does not equal any value, including itself.

Here are some examples:

console.log(NaN/2);
// NaN
console.log(NaN == NaN);
// false

The string type

In JavaScript, a string is a sequence of zero or more characters. A string literal begins and ends with either a single quote(') or a double quote (").

A string that begins with a double quote must end with a double quote. Likewise, a string that begins with a single quote must also end with a single quote:

let greeting = 'Hi';
let message  = "Bye";

If you want to single quotes or double quotes in a literal string, you need to use the backslash to escape it. For example:

let message = 'I\\'m also a valid string';
// use \\ to escape the single quote (')

JavaScript strings are immutable. This means that it cannot be modified once created. However, you can create a new string from an existing string. For example:

let str = 'JavaScript';
str = str + ' String';

In this example:

• First, declare the str variable and initialize it to a string of 'JavaScript'.
• Second, use the + operator to combine 'JavaScript' with ' String' to make its value 'Javascript String'.

Behind the scene, the JavaScript engine creates a new string that holds the new string 'JavaScript String' and destroys the original strings 'JavaScript' and ' String'.

The following example attempts to change the first character of the string JavaScript:

let s = 'JavaScript';
s[0] = 'j';
console.log(s)

The output is:

'JavaScript'

But not:

'javaScript'

The boolean type

The boolean type has two literal values: true and false in lowercase. The following example declares two variables that hold the boolean values.

let inProgress = true;
let completed = false;

console.log(typeof completed);
// boolean

JavaScript allows values of other types to be converted into boolean values of true or false.

To convert a value of another data type into a boolean value, you use the Boolean() function. The following table shows the conversion rules:

Type	true	false
string	non-empty string	empty string
number	non-zero number and Infinity	0, NaN
object	non-null object	null
undefined		undefined

For example:

console.log(Boolean('Hi'));// true
console.log(Boolean(''));  // false

console.log(Boolean(20));  // true
console.log(Boolean(Infinity));  // true
console.log(Boolean(0));  // false

console.log(Boolean({foo: 100}));  // true on non-empty object
console.log(Boolean(null));// false

The symbol type

JavaScript added a primitive type in ES6: the symbol. Different from other primitive types, the symbol type does not have a literal form.

To create a symbol, you call the Symbol function as follows:

let s1 = Symbol();

The Symbol function creates a new unique value every time you call it.

console.log(Symbol() == Symbol());
// false

Note that you’ll learn more about symbols in the symbol chapter.

The bigint type

The bigint type represents the whole numbers that are larger than 253 – 1. To form a bigint literal number, you append the letter n at the end of the number:

let pageView = 9007199254740991n;
console.log(typeof(pageView));
// 'bigint'

The object type

In JavaScript, an object is a collection of properties, where each property is defined as a key-value pair.

The following example defines an empty object using the object literal syntax:

let emptyObject = {};

The following example defines the person object with two properties: firstName and lastName.

let person = {
    firstName: 'John',
    lastName: 'Doe'
};

A property name of an object can be any string. You can use quotes around the property name if it is not a valid identifier.

For example, if the person object has a property first-name, you must place it in the quotes such as "first-name".

A property of an object can hold an object. For example:

let contact = {
    firstName: 'John',
    lastName: 'Doe',
    email: 'john.doe@example.com',
    phone: '(408)-555-9999',
    address: {
        building: '4000',
        street: 'North 1st street',
        city: 'San Jose',
        state: 'CA',
        country: 'USA'
    }
}

The contact object has the firstName, lastName, email, phone, and address properties.

The address property itself holds an object that has building,  street, city, state, and country properties.

To access an object’s property, you can use

• The dot notation (.)
• The array-like notation ([]).

The following example uses the dot notation (.) to access the firstName and lastName properties of the contact object.

console.log(contact.firstName);
console.log(contact.lastName);

If you reference a property that does not exist, you’ll get an undefined value. For example:

console.log(contact.age);
// undefined

The following example uses the array-like notation to access the email and phone properties of the contact object.

console.log(contact['phone']);
// '(408)-555-9999'
console.log(contact['email']);
// 'john.doe@example.com'