Bubble Sort Algorithm

A in-place sorting algorithm that repeatedly compares two adjacent elements and swaps them if they are out of order. This algorithm is rarely applied in the real world because of its poor performance(O(n²)).

Bubble sort summary card

Table of Contents
· How Does Bubble Sort Algorithm Work?
· Graphical Explanation
· Code Implementation
  ∘ Complexity
  ∘ Pseudocode
  ∘ Golang
  ∘ Python

How Does Bubble Sort Algorithm Work?

Bubble sort algorithm traverses through the array and compare two adjacent elements from left to right. If the set of elements are out of order, swap them. It repeats this process until all the elements are in a correct order.

Graphical Explanation

sorting array

Bubble sort process

Code Implementation

Complexity

Time: Best O(n), Average O(n²), Worst O(n²)
Space: O(1)
n: the total number of elements in the input array

Pseudocode

n = len(array)
for i in range n:
    for j in range(n - i - 1):
       if array[j] > array[j+1]:
         swap(array[j], array[j+1])

Golang

Python

You can access the source code here.

Other sorting algorithms:

• Insertion sort algorithm
• Selection sort algorithm
• Quick sort algorithm
• Heap sort algorithm
• Merge sort algorithm
• Counting sort algorithm
• Bucket sort algorithm
• Radix sort algorithm
• Sorting algorithms summary