#074 Apr 11, 2026

74. slice::is_sorted — Ask the Slice if It's Already Sorted

You’ve written windows(2).all(|w| w[0] <= w[1]) one too many times. The is_sorted family of methods says what you actually mean — in one call.

Checking whether data is already in order used to mean rolling your own predicate:

1
2
3
4
5
let data = vec![1, 3, 5, 7, 9];

// The old way — correct but noisy:
let sorted = data.windows(2).all(|w| w[0] <= w[1]);
assert!(sorted);

It works, but you have to remember windows(2), get the comparison direction right, and hope the next reader recognizes the pattern.

Now there’s a method that does exactly this:

1
2
3
4
5
let data = vec![1, 3, 5, 7, 9];
assert!(data.is_sorted());

let messy = vec![1, 9, 3, 7, 5];
assert!(!messy.is_sorted());

Empty slices and single-element slices are considered sorted — no edge-case surprises:

1
2
3
let empty: Vec<i32> = vec![];
assert!(empty.is_sorted());
assert!(vec![42].is_sorted());

Need a custom comparator? is_sorted_by takes a closure over pairs of references and returns bool:

1
2
3
4
// Check if sorted by absolute value
let vals: Vec<i32> = vec![-1, 2, -3, 4];
let sorted_by_abs = vals.is_sorted_by(|a, b| a.abs() <= b.abs());
assert!(sorted_by_abs);

And is_sorted_by_key extracts a key first — perfect for structs:

 1
 2
 3
 4
 5
 6
 7
 8
 9
10
11
12
struct Task {
    priority: u8,
    name: &'static str,
}

let tasks = vec![
    Task { priority: 1, name: "urgent" },
    Task { priority: 3, name: "normal" },
    Task { priority: 5, name: "backlog" },
];

assert!(tasks.is_sorted_by_key(|t| t.priority));

A practical use: skip sorting when the data is already ordered:

1
2
3
4
5
let mut data = vec![1, 2, 3, 4, 5];
if !data.is_sorted() {
    data.sort();
}
// Avoids the O(n log n) sort when data is already O(n)-verified sorted

Available on slices and by extension on Vec, arrays, and anything that derefs to [T]. Stabilized in Rust 1.82 — no crate needed.

This post is licensed under CC BY 4.0 by the author.