Question

I’m trying to find out if anyone knows about an already existing jQuery plugin that will count up to a target number at a specified speed.

For example, take a look at Google’s number of MB of free storage on the Gmail homepage, under the heading that reads “Lots of space”. It has a starting number in a <span> tag, and slowly counts upward every second.

I’m looking for something similar, but I’d like to be able to specify:

• The start number
• The end number
• The amount of time it should take to get from start to end.
• A custom callback function that can execute when a counter is finished.

Answer 1

I ended up creating my own plugin. Here it is in case this helps anyone:

(function($) {
    $.fn.countTo = function(options) {
        // merge the default plugin settings with the custom options
        options = $.extend({}, $.fn.countTo.defaults, options || {});
        
        // how many times to update the value, and how much to increment the value on each update
        var loops = Math.ceil(options.speed / options.refreshInterval),
            increment = (options.to - options.from) / loops;
        
        return $(this).each(function() {
            var _this = this,
                loopCount = 0,
                value = options.from,
                interval = setInterval(updateTimer, options.refreshInterval);
            
            function updateTimer() {
                value += increment;
                loopCount++;
                $(_this).html(value.toFixed(options.decimals));
                
                if (typeof(options.onUpdate) == 'function') {
                    options.onUpdate.call(_this, value);
                }
                
                if (loopCount >= loops) {
                    clearInterval(interval);
                    value = options.to;
                    
                    if (typeof(options.onComplete) == 'function') {
                        options.onComplete.call(_this, value);
                    }
                }
            }
        });
    };
    
    $.fn.countTo.defaults = {
        from: 0,  // the number the element should start at
        to: 100,  // the number the element should end at
        speed: 1000,  // how long it should take to count between the target numbers
        refreshInterval: 100,  // how often the element should be updated
        decimals: 0,  // the number of decimal places to show
        onUpdate: null,  // callback method for every time the element is updated,
        onComplete: null,  // callback method for when the element finishes updating
    };
})(jQuery);

Here’s some sample code of how to use it:

<script type="text/javascript"><!--
    jQuery(function($) {
        $('.timer').countTo({
            from: 50,
            to: 2500,
            speed: 1000,
            refreshInterval: 50,
            onComplete: function(value) {
                console.debug(this);
            }
        });
    });
//--></script>

<span class="timer"></span>

View the demo on JSFiddle: http://jsfiddle.net/YWn9t/