Question

I have a question about the default behavior of JavaScript’s parseFloat function in different parts of the world.

In the US, if you call parseFloat on a string “123.34”, you’d get a floating point number 123.34.

If I’m developing code in say Sweden or Brazil and they use a comma instead of a period as the decimal separator, does the parseFloat function expect “123,34” or “123.34”.

Please note that I’m not asking how to parse a different culture’s number format in the US. I’m asking does parseFloat in Sweden or Brazil behave the same way it does inside the US, or does it expect a number in its local format? Or to better think about this, does a developer in Brazil/Sweden have to convert strings to English format before it can use parseFloat after extracting text from a text box?

Please let me know if this doesn’t make sense.

Answer 1

parseFloat doesn’t use your locale’s definition, but the definition of a decimal literal.

It only parses . not ,

I’m brazilian and I have to replace comma with dot before parsing decimal numbers.

parseFloat specification