What is the difference between PHP header and Javascript window.location?

Question

So yeah this came to mind randomly when I was teaching someone how to redirect their page. I wasn't really sure what the main difference was... Is there a reason you would use one over the other? I guess if you are not coding in PHP, you would have to use the Javascript window.location to redirect but would you ever use window.location over PHP header if you were developing in PHP? I feel they have very similar functions but perhaps I am missing something.

Answer 1

The browser will process the header redirect right away, whereas the Javascript redirect will not be executed until the page has loaded (or at least enough of it to run the Javascript). Also, it will be the Javascript engine executing the redirect instead of the browser itself.

Doing it via the header will perform better. (slightly anyway...)