Difference between window.location.assign(url) and window.open(url, '_self')

Question

What's the difference between window.location.assign(url) and window.open(url, '_self')?

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Answer 1

Functionally? Not much. They do similar things in different ways.

Personally, I'd probably choose window.location over window.open. Even though they do the same things, using window.location for changing the current window is more common, and doesn't require knowing about '_self', which isn't used that often. My experience is my coworkers expect window.open to involve opening a window versus reusing the same one.