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Documentation / @andrew_l/snowflake / Snowflake

Class: Snowflake ​

A class for generating and deconstructing Twitter snowflakes.

A Twitter snowflake is a 64-bit unsigned integer with 4 fields that have a fixed epoch value.

If we have a snowflake 266241948824764416 we can represent it as binary:

64                                          22     17     12          0
 000000111011000111100001101001000101000000  00001  00000  000000000000
          number of ms since epoch           worker  pid    increment

Constructors ​

Constructor ​

new Snowflake(opts): Snowflake

Parameters ​

opts ​

number | bigint | SnowflakeOptions | Date

Returns ​

Snowflake

Properties ​

decode() ​

decode: (id) => DeconstructedSnowflake

Alias for deconstruct

Deconstructs a snowflake given a snowflake ID

Parameters ​

id ​

the snowflake to deconstruct

string | bigint | Uint8Array

Returns ​

DeconstructedSnowflake

a deconstructed snowflake

Example ​

typescript
const epoch = new Date('2000-01-01T00:00:00.000Z');
const snowflake = new Snowflake(epoch).deconstruct('3971046231244935168');

Accessors ​

epoch ​

Get Signature ​

get epoch(): number

The epoch for this snowflake, as a number

Returns ​

number

processId ​

Get Signature ​

get processId(): number

Gets the configured process ID

Returns ​

number

Set Signature ​

set processId(value): void

Sets the process ID that will be used by default for the generate method

Parameters ​
value ​

The new value, will be masked with 0b11111

number | bigint

Returns ​

void

workerId ​

Get Signature ​

get workerId(): number

Gets the configured worker ID

Returns ​

number

Set Signature ​

set workerId(value): void

Sets the worker ID that will be used by default for the generate method

Parameters ​
value ​

The new value, will be masked with 0b11111

number | bigint

Returns ​

void

Methods ​

deconstruct() ​

deconstruct(id): DeconstructedSnowflake

Deconstructs a snowflake given a snowflake ID

Parameters ​

id ​

the snowflake to deconstruct

string | bigint | Uint8Array

Returns ​

DeconstructedSnowflake

a deconstructed snowflake

Example ​

typescript
const epoch = new Date('2000-01-01T00:00:00.000Z');
const snowflake = new Snowflake(epoch).deconstruct('3971046231244935168');

generate() ​

generate(timestamp): bigint

Generates a Snowflake ID as a Uint8Array buffer.

Parameters ​

timestamp ​

number | Date

Returns ​

bigint

generateBuffer() ​

generateBuffer(timestamp): Uint8Array

Generates a snowflake given an epoch and optionally a timestamp

Parameters ​

timestamp ​

number | Date

Returns ​

Uint8Array

A unique snowflake as Uint8Array

Example ​

typescript
const epoch = new Date('2000-01-01T00:00:00.000Z');
const snowflake = new Snowflake({ epoch }).generate();

generateBufferUnsafe() ​

generateBufferUnsafe(timestamp): Uint8Array

Generates a Snowflake ID as a Uint8Array buffer.

⚠️ Returns a reference to the same internal Uint8Array instance. Its contents may be overwritten on the next ID generation call.

This method is intended for high-performance scenarios where you immediately transform the buffer (e.g., to base62) before calling again. Avoid storing or mutating the returned buffer directly.

Parameters ​

timestamp ​

number | Date

Returns ​

Uint8Array

timestampFrom() ​

timestampFrom(id): number

Retrieves the timestamp field's value from a snowflake.

Parameters ​

id ​

The snowflake to get the timestamp value from.

string | bigint | Uint8Array

Returns ​

number

The UNIX timestamp that is stored in id.

bufferFrom() ​

static bufferFrom(value): Uint8Array

Parse value as Uint8Array buffer

Parameters ​

value ​

string | bigint

Returns ​

Uint8Array

compare() ​

static compare(a, b): -1 | 0 | 1

Returns a number indicating whether a reference snowflake comes before, or after, or is same as the given snowflake in sort order.

Parameters ​

a ​

The first snowflake to compare.

string | bigint | Uint8Array

b ​

The second snowflake to compare.

string | bigint | Uint8Array

Returns ​

-1 | 0 | 1

-1 if a is older than b, 0 if a and b are equals, 1 if a is newer than b.