javascript - Is storing jQuery elements in variables more efficient?

Question

Which is more efficient please?

var myElement = $("#the-name-of-my-element")

myElement.doSomethingOnce;
myElement.doSomethingTwice;
...
myElement.doSomethingTenTimes;

or

$("#the-name-of-my-element").doSomethingOnce;
$("#the-name-of-my-element").doSomethingTwice;
...
$("#the-name-of-my-element").doSomethingTenTimes;

I have a page in which the html elements have many varied and sometimes repeated interactions with the JS so I'm wondering if storing the element in a variable prevents multiple jQuery "queries".

As my project is a web app, I'm keen to tune up what I can for the browser.

Answer 1

It is always good practice to cache your nodes. The amount of work the JS engine has to do to locate the nodes is more expensive than the memory that you will use storing the node (of course unless you are storing a massive DOM tree or something).

So the winner is:

var myElement = $("#the-name-of-my-element")

myElement.doSomethingOnce;
myElement.doSomethingTwice;
...
myElement.doSomethingTenTimes;