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Elixir is a functional, concurrent, high-level general-purpose programming language that runs on the BEAM virtual machine, which is also used to implement the Erlang programming language.[3] Elixir builds on top of Erlang and shares the same abstractions for building distributed, fault-tolerant applications. Elixir also provides tooling and an extensible design. The latter is supported by compile-time metaprogramming with macros and polymorphism via protocols.[4]
 |
 Elixir | |
| Paradigms | multi-paradigm: functional, concurrent, distributed, process-oriented |
|---|---|
| Designed by | José Valim |
| First appeared | 2012 |
| Stable release | |
| Typing discipline | dynamic, strong |
| Platform | Erlang |
| License | Apache License 2.0[2] |
| Filename extensions | .ex, .exs |
| Website | elixir-lang |
| Influenced by | |
| Clojure, Erlang, Ruby | |
| Influenced | |
| Gleam, LFE | |
The community organizes yearly events in the United States,[5] Europe,[6] and Japan,[7] as well as minor local events and conferences.[8][9]
José Valim created the Elixir programming language as a research and development project at Plataformatec. His goals were to enable higher extensibility and productivity in the Erlang VM while maintaining compatibility with Erlang's ecosystem.[10][11]
Elixir is aimed at large-scale sites and apps. It uses features of Ruby, Erlang, and Clojure to develop a high-concurrency and low-latency language. It was designed to handle large data volumes. Elixir is also used in telecommunications, e-commerce, and finance.[12]
In 2021, the Numerical Elixir effort was announced with the goal of bringing machine learning, neural networks, GPU compilation, data processing, and computational notebooks to the Elixir ecosystem.[13]
Each of the minor versions supports a specific range of Erlang/OTP versions.[14] The current stable release version is 1.17.3[1] 
.
- Compiles to bytecode for the BEAM virtual machine of Erlang.[15] Full interoperability with Erlang code, without runtime impact.
- Scalability and fault-tolerance, thanks to Erlang's lightweight concurrency mechanisms[15]
- Built-in tooling for managing dependencies, code compilation, running tests, formatting code, remote debugging and more.
- An interactive REPL inside running programs, including Phoenix web servers, with code reloading and access to internal state
- Everything is an expression[15]
- Pattern matching[15] to promote assertive code[16]
- Type hints for static analysis tools
- Immutable data, with an emphasis, like other functional languages, on recursion and higher-order functions instead of side-effect-based looping
- Shared nothing concurrent programming via message passing (actor model)[17]
- Lazy and async collections with streams
- Railway oriented programming via the
withconstruct[18] - Hygienic metaprogramming by direct access to the abstract syntax tree (AST).[15] Libraries often implement small domain-specific languages, such as for databases or testing.
- Code execution at compile time. The Elixir compiler also runs on the BEAM, so modules that are being compiled can immediately run code which has already been compiled.
- Polymorphism via a mechanism called protocols. Dynamic dispatch, as in Clojure, however, without multiple dispatch because Elixir protocols dispatch on a single type.
- Support for documentation via Python-like docstrings in the Markdown formatting language[15]
- Unicode support and UTF-8 strings
The following examples can be run in an iex shell or saved in a file and run from the command line by typing elixir <filename>.
Classic Hello world example:
iex> IO.puts("Hello World!")
Hello World!
Pipe operator:
iex> "Elixir" |> String.graphemes() |> Enum.frequencies()
%{"E" => 1, "i" => 2, "l" => 1, "r" => 1, "x" => 1}
iex> %{values: 1..5} |> Map.get(:values) |> Enum.map(& &1 * 2)
[2, 4, 6, 8, 10]
iex> |> Enum.sum()
30
Pattern matching (a.k.a. destructuring):
iex> %{left: x} = %{left: 5, right: 8}
iex> x
5
iex> {:ok, [_ | rest]} = {:ok, [1, 2, 3]}
iex> rest
[2, 3]
Pattern matching with multiple clauses:
iex> case File.read("path/to/file") do
iex> {:ok, contents} -> IO.puts("found file: #{contents}")
iex> {:error, reason} -> IO.puts("missing file: #{reason}")
iex> end
iex> for n <- 1..5, rem(n, 2) == 1, do: n*n
[1, 9, 25]
Asynchronously reading files with streams:
1..5
|> Task.async_stream(&File.read!("#{&1}.txt"))
|> Stream.filter(fn {:ok, contents} -> String.trim(contents) != "" end)
|> Enum.join("\n")
Multiple function bodies with guards:
def fib(n) when n in [0, 1], do: n
def fib(n), do: fib(n-2) + fib(n-1)
Relational databases with the Ecto library:
schema "weather" do
field :city # Defaults to type :string
field :temp_lo, :integer
field :temp_hi, :integer
field :prcp, :float, default: 0.0
end
Weather |> where(city: "Kraków") |> order_by(:temp_lo) |> limit(10) |> Repo.all
Sequentially spawning a thousand processes:
for num <- 1..1000, do: spawn fn -> IO.puts("#{num * 2}") end
Asynchronously performing a task:
task = Task.async fn -> perform_complex_action() end
other_time_consuming_action()
Task.await task
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