It is used for server-side programming, and primarily deployed for non-blocking, event-driven servers, such as traditional web sites and back-end API services, but was originally designed with real-time, push-based architectures in mind. Every browser has its own version of a JS engine, and node.js is built on Google Chrome’s V8 JavaScript engine.

Node.js is a single-threaded, open-source, cross-platform runtime environment for building fast and scalable server-side and networking applications. It runs on the V8 JavaScript runtime engine, and it uses event-driven, non-blocking I/O architecture, which makes it efficient and suitable for real-time applications.

Node.js uses the “Single Threaded Event Loop” architecture to handle multiple clients at the same time. To understand how this is different from other runtimes, we need to understand how multi-threaded concurrent clients are handled in languages like Java.

In a multi-threaded request-response model, multiple clients send a request, and the server processes each one before sending the response back. However, multiple threads are used to process concurrent calls. These threads are defined in a thread pool, and each time a request comes in, an individual thread is assigned to handle it.

Node.js maintains a limited thread pool to serve requests. Whenever a request comes, Node.js places it into a queue. Now, the single-threaded “Event loop”—the core component—comes into the picture. This event loop waits for requests indefinitely. When a request comes in, the loop picks it up from the queue and checks whether it requires a blocking input/output (I/O) operation. If not, it processes the request and sends a response.

Node.js is quite easy to start with. It’s a go-to choice for web development beginners. With a lot of tutorials and a large community—getting started is very easy. It provides vast scalability for applications. Node.js, being single-threaded, is capable of handling a huge number of simultaneous connections with high throughput.

Non-blocking thread execution makes Node.js even faster and more efficient. A vast set of open-source Node.js packages is available that can simplify your work. There are more than one million packages in the NPM ecosystem today. Node.js is written in C and C++, which makes it speedy and adds features like networking support.

Cross-platform support allows you to create SaaS websites, desktop apps, and even mobile apps, all using Node.js. Node.js is an easy choice for developers since both the frontend and backend can be managed with JavaScript as a single languag

Node.js is used by big business and small enterprises alike. While the likes of Amazon, Netflix, eBay, Reddit and Paypal all use it, over 43% of developers using Node.JS do so for enterprise applications.

Some of the most common words users associate with Node.js are: fast, simple, easy, powerful and flexible. Node.js is not perfect for every project, of course, but with all of this in mind it’s easy to see why it’s so popular with start-ups and globals alike.

JavaScript, which underpins Node.js, has been one of the most popular programming languages available for some time. While it has more commonly been used for front-end web development, it has also gained ground in different areas of application and on distinct platforms, such as Node.js.

Even though Node.js was originally written in 2009, it wasn’t widely adopted until recently. Currently, numerous successful brands have leveraged Node.js to develop both front and back-end applications, including Walmart, Netflix, Medium, LinkedIn or Groupon.

The avalanche of requests and data coming from IoT devices does not block Node.js servers thanks to their event-driven architecture and asynchronous processing suitable for I/O-heavy operations on the IoT network. This makes Node.js fast as an application layer between these devices and the databases that store data from them.