Why NanoID Is Outpacing UUID: Faster, Smaller, Safer IDs for Your Projects

Understanding NanoID and Its Usage

UUID has long been a standard identifier, but NanoID is emerging as a strong competitor.

Install the NanoID package with npm i nanoid and import it in your JavaScript project:

import { nanoid } from 'nanoid';
model.id = nanoid();

NanoID receives over 11.75 million weekly NPM downloads and runs about 60% faster than UUID.

Compared to UUID, NanoID is roughly 4.5 times smaller (108 bits) and produces more compact IDs, reducing data size for storage and transmission.

Key Advantages

1. Smaller Size

Shorter IDs lower bandwidth and storage costs, especially as applications scale.

2. Better Security

NanoID uses the crypto module and the Web Crypto API instead of the insecure Math.random(), and employs a uniform algorithm rather than a simple random % alphabet approach.

3. Speed and Compactness

NanoID is about 60% faster than UUID and uses only 21 characters versus UUID’s 36.

0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ_abcdefghijklmnopqrstuvwxyz-

It supports 14 programming languages, including JavaScript, Go, Rust, Python, and more.

4. Compatibility

Works with libraries such as PouchDB, CouchDB, WebWorkers, Rollup, React, and React‑Native. You can generate an ID directly from the terminal with npx nanoid.

5. Custom Alphabet

Developers can define their own alphabet and ID length:

import { customAlphabet } from 'nanoid';
const nanoid = customAlphabet('ABCDEF1234567890', 12);
model.id = nanoid();

6. No Third‑Party Dependencies

NanoID has zero external dependencies, which helps keep bundle size small and reduces potential dependency‑related issues.

Limitations and Future Focus

While NanoID has no major drawbacks, its IDs are less human‑readable, which can make debugging harder. Using NanoID as a primary key with a clustered index may cause performance issues because the IDs are not sequential.

Looking Ahead

NanoID is rapidly becoming the preferred unique‑ID generator for JavaScript developers, offering speed, compactness, and security advantages over UUID.

According to benchmark tests, NanoID can generate over 2.2 million IDs per second with the default alphabet and over 1.8 million per second with a custom alphabet.

Given its small size, URL‑friendliness, security, and speed, NanoID is recommended for new projects over UUID.