Difference between map and flatMap in Scala

In Scala, both map and flatMap are higher-order functions used for processing collections like lists, arrays, etc. The main difference between map and flatMap lies in their return types and behavior.

Map

The map function is used to apply a given function to each element of a collection and return the result in a new collection without changing the structure of the original collection. It produces a new collection of the same size as the original collection.

FlatMap

On the other hand, flatMap is used when the function applied to each element returns a collection, and flatMap flattens these nested collections into a single collection. It can be used to transform and flatten nested collections into a single collection while maintaining the order of elements.

So, in summary, map transforms each element individually and returns a collection of the same size, while flatMap can transform elements into nested collections and flatten them into a single collection.