Async functions - require .then to execute them?

Question

promises are executed only if you call .then on them or this is how I learned it.

Async functions are what I understand functions "turned" promises. Do I need to call .then on them each time I want to invoke an async function?

async function loadStory(){}
....
loadStory()
or
loadStory().then

Apparently you learned it wrong. Promises are not "executed" at all. Where did you learn this? — Bergi, Nov 22 '17 at 11:06
ES8 `async functions` are nothing but syntactic sugar for a normal function that returns a promise. — Bergi, Nov 22 '17 at 11:07

score 0 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 22 '17 at 11:09

Async functions are executed as per regular functions by invoking them as usual.

In order to make your code appear synchronous and utilise the benefits of async / await you'll need to prefix the call with await.

For example:

async function example () {
    return new Promise(resolve => {
        resolve('hello');
    });
}

const myReturnedValue = await example();

Because of the await keyword, myReturnedValue will be the result of the resolved promise returned by the example function.

1 Answers1