Difference between List and Array types in Kotlin

Arrays and lists (represented by List<T> and its subtype MutableList<T>) have many differences, here are the most significant ones:

• Array<T> is a class with known implementation: it’s a sequential fixed-size memory region storing the items (and on JVM it is represented by Java array).

  List<T> and MutableList<T> are interfaces which have different implementations: ArrayList<T>, LinkedList<T> etc. Memory representation and operations logic of lists are defined in concrete implementation, e.g. indexing in a LinkedList<T> goes through the links and takes O(n) time whereas ArrayList<T> stores its items in a dynamically allocated array.

  val list1: List<Int> = LinkedList<Int>()
  val list2: List<Int> = ArrayList<Int>()
  

• Array<T> is mutable (it can be changed through any reference to it), but List<T> doesn’t have modifying methods (it is either read-only view of MutableList<T> or an immutable list implementation).

  val a = arrayOf(1, 2, 3)
  a[0] = a[1] // OK
  
  val l = listOf(1, 2, 3)
  l[0] = l[1] // doesn't compile
  
  val m = mutableListOf(1, 2, 3)
  m[0] = m[1] // OK
  

• Arrays have fixed size and cannot expand or shrink retaining identity (you need to copy an array to resize it). As to the lists, MutableList<T> has add and remove functions, so that it can increase and reduce its size.

  val a = arrayOf(1, 2, 3)
  println(a.size) // will always be 3 for this array
  
  val l = mutableListOf(1, 2, 3)
  l.add(4)
  println(l.size) // 4
  

• Array<T> is invariant on T (Array<Int> is not Array<Number>), the same for MutableList<T>, but List<T> is covariant (List<Int> is List<Number>).

  val a: Array<Number> = Array<Int>(0) { 0 } // won't compile
  val l: List<Number> = listOf(1, 2, 3) // OK
  

• Arrays are optimized for primitives: there are separate IntArray, DoubleArray, CharArray etc. which are mapped to Java primitive arrays (int[], double[], char[]), not boxed ones (Array<Int> is mapped to Java’s Integer[]). Lists in general do not have implementations optimized for primitives, though some libraries (outside JDK) provide primitive-optimized lists.

• List<T> and MutableList<T> are mapped types and have special behaviour in Java interoperability (Java’s List<T> is seen from Kotlin as either List<T> or MutableList<T>). Arrays are also mapped, but they have other rules of Java interoperability.

• Certain array types are used in annotations (primitive arrays, Array<String>, and arrays with enum class entries), and there’s a special array literal syntax for annotations. Lists and other collections cannot be used in annotations.

• As to the usage, good practice is to prefer using lists over arrays everywhere except for performance critical parts of your code, the reasoning is the same to that for Java.