What is the difference between new/delete and malloc/free?
C++Memory ManagementC++ Problem Overview
What is the difference between new
/delete
and malloc
/free
?
Related (duplicate?): In what cases do I use malloc vs new?
C++ Solutions
Solution 1 - C++
new
/ delete
- Allocate / release memory
- Memory allocated from 'Free Store'.
- Returns a fully typed pointer.
new
(standard version) never returns aNULL
(will throw on failure).- Are called with Type-ID (compiler calculates the size).
- Has a version explicitly to handle arrays.
- Reallocating (to get more space) not handled intuitively (because of copy constructor).
- Whether they call
malloc
/free
is implementation defined. - Can add a new memory allocator to deal with low memory (
std::set_new_handler
). operator new
/operator delete
can be overridden legally.- Constructor / destructor used to initialize / destroy the object.
malloc
/ free
- Allocate / release memory
- Memory allocated from 'Heap'.
- Returns a
void*
. - Returns
NULL
on failure. - Must specify the size required in bytes.
- Allocating array requires manual calculation of space.
- Reallocating larger chunk of memory simple (no copy constructor to worry about).
- They will NOT call
new
/delete
. - No way to splice user code into the allocation sequence to help with low memory.
malloc
/free
can NOT be overridden legally.
Table comparison of the features:
Feature | new / delete |
malloc / free |
---|---|---|
Memory allocated from | 'Free Store' | 'Heap' |
Returns | Fully typed pointer | void* |
On failure | Throws (never returns NULL ) |
Returns NULL |
Required size | Calculated by compiler | Must be specified in bytes |
Handling arrays | Has an explicit version | Requires manual calculations |
Reallocating | Not handled intuitively | Simple (no copy constructor) |
Call of reverse | Implementation defined | No |
Low memory cases | Can add a new memory allocator | Not handled by user code |
Overridable | Yes | No |
Use of constructor / destructor | Yes | No |
Technically, memory allocated by new
comes from the 'Free Store' while memory allocated by malloc
comes from the 'Heap'. Whether these two areas are the same is an implementation detail, which is another reason that malloc
and new
cannot be mixed.
Solution 2 - C++
The most relevant difference is that the new
operator allocates memory then calls the constructor, and delete
calls the destructor then deallocates the memory.
Solution 3 - C++
new
calls the ctor of the object, delete
call the dtor.
malloc
& free
just allocate and release raw memory.
Solution 4 - C++
new
/delete
is C++, malloc
/free
comes from good old C.
In C++, new
calls an objects constructor and delete
calls the destructor.
malloc
and free
, coming from the dark ages before OO, only allocate and free the memory, without executing any code of the object.
Solution 5 - C++
In C++ new
/delete
call the Constructor/Destructor accordingly.
malloc
/free
simply allocate memory from the heap. new
/delete
allocate memory as well.
Solution 6 - C++
The main difference between new and malloc is that new invokes the object's constructor and the corresponding call to delete invokes the object's destructor.
There are other differences:
-
new
is type-safe,malloc
returns objects of typevoid*
-
new
throws an exception on error,malloc
returnsNULL
and sets errno -
new
is an operator and can be overloaded,malloc
is a function and cannot be overloaded -
new[]
, which allocates arrays, is more intuitive and type-safe thanmalloc
-
malloc
-derived allocations can be resized viarealloc
,new
-derived allocations cannot be resized -
malloc
can allocate an N-byte chunk of memory,new
must be asked to allocate an array of, say,char
types
Looking at the differences, a summary is malloc is C-esque, new is C++-esque. Use the one that feels right for your code base.
Although it is legal for new and malloc to be implemented using different memory allocation algorithms, on most systems new is internally implemented using malloc, yielding no system-level difference.
Solution 7 - C++
The only similarities are that malloc
/new
both return a pointer which addresses some memory on the heap, and they both guarantee that once such a block of memory has been returned, it won't be returned again unless you free/delete it first. That is, they both "allocate" memory.
However, new
/delete
perform arbitrary other work in addition, via constructors, destructors and operator overloading. malloc
/free
only ever allocate and free memory.
In fact, new
is sufficiently customisable that it doesn't necessarily return memory from the heap, or even allocate memory at all. However the default new
does.
Solution 8 - C++
There are a few things which new
does that malloc
doesn’t:
new
constructs the object by calling the constructor of that objectnew
doesn’t require typecasting of allocated memory.- It doesn’t require an amount of memory to be allocated, rather it requires a number of objects to be constructed.
So, if you use malloc
, then you need to do above things explicitly, which is not always practical. Additionally, new
can be overloaded but malloc
can’t be.
In a word, if you use C++, try to use new
as much as possible.
Solution 9 - C++
also,
the global new and delete can be overridden, malloc/free cannot.
further more new and delete can be overridden per type.
Solution 10 - C++
new
and delete
are C++ primitives which declare a new instance of a class or delete it (thus invoking the destructor of the class for the instance).
malloc
and free
are C functions and they allocate and free memory blocks (in size).
Both use the heap to make the allocation. malloc
and free
are nonetheless more "low level" as they just reserve a chunk of memory space which will probably be associated with a pointer. No structures are created around that memory (unless you consider a C array to be a structure).
Solution 11 - C++
new and delete are operators in c++; which can be overloaded too. malloc and free are function in c;
malloc returns null ptr when fails while new throws exception.
address returned by malloc need to by type casted again as it returns the (void*)malloc(size) New return the typed pointer.
Solution 12 - C++
- new is an operator, whereas malloc() is a fucntion.
- new returns exact data type, while malloc() returns void * (pointer of type void).
- malloc(), memory is not initialized and default value is garbage, whereas in case of new, memory is initialized with default value, like with 'zero (0)' in case on int.
- delete and free() both can be used for 'NULL' pointers.
Solution 13 - C++
- To use the
malloc()
, we need to include<stdlib.h>
or<alloc.h>
in the program which is not required fornew
. new
anddelete
can be overloaded butmalloc
can not.- Using the placement
new
, we can pass the address where we want to allocate memory but this is not possible in case ofmalloc
.
Solution 14 - C++
This code for use of delete keyword or free function. But when create a pointer object using 'malloc' or 'new' and deallocate object memory using delete even that object pointer can be call function in the class. After that use free instead of delete then also it works after free statement , but when use both then only pointer object can't call to function in class.. the code is as follows :
#include<iostream>
using namespace std;
class ABC{
public: ABC(){
cout<<"Hello"<<endl;
}
void disp(){
cout<<"Hi\n";
}
};
int main(){
ABC* b=(ABC*)malloc(sizeof(ABC));
int* q = new int[20];
ABC *a=new ABC();
b->disp();
cout<<b<<endl;
free(b);
delete b;
//a=NULL;
b->disp();
ABC();
cout<<b;
return 0;
}
> output :
>
> Hello
> Hi
> 0x2abfef37cc20
Solution 15 - C++
1.new syntex is simpler than malloc()
2.new/delete is a operator where malloc()/free() is a function.
3.new/delete execute faster than malloc()/free() because new assemly code directly pasted by the compiler.
4.we can change new/delete meaning in program with the help of operator overlading.