Collect will collect every value , and CollectLatest will stop current work to collect latest value,
The crucial difference from collect is that when the original flow emits a new value then the action block for the previous value is cancelled.
flow {
emit(1)
delay(50)
emit(2)
}.collect { value ->
println("Collecting $value")
delay(100) // Emulate work
println("$value collected")
}
prints "Collecting 1, 1 collected, Collecting 2, 2 collected"
flow {
emit(1)
delay(50)
emit(2)
}.collectLatest { value ->
println("Collecting $value")
delay(100) // Emulate work
println("$value collected")
}
prints "Collecting 1, Collecting 2, 2 collected"
So , if every update is important like state, view, preferences updates, etc , collect should be used .
And if some updates can be overridden with no loss , like database updates , collectLatest should be used.