{"id":9878,"date":"2014-12-15T17:04:15","date_gmt":"2014-12-15T17:04:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/tail-recursion\/"},"modified":"2017-05-19T11:26:23","modified_gmt":"2017-05-19T11:26:23","slug":"tail-recursion","status":"publish","type":"definition","link":"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion","title":{"rendered":"Tail Recursion"},"content":{"rendered":"<h2><span id=\"what_does_tail_recursion_mean\">What Does Tail Recursion Mean?<\/span><\/h2>\n<p>Tail recursion is the act of calling a recursive function at the end of a particular code module rather than in the middle. A function is recursive if it calls itself. This programming concept is often useful for self-referencing functions and plays a major role in programming languages such as LISP.\n<\/p>\n<h2><span id=\"techopedia_explains_tail_recursion\">Techopedia Explains Tail Recursion<\/span><\/h2>\n<p>In computer programming, a function that calls itself, either directly or indirectly, is a recursive function. When this call happens at the end of the function, it is called tail recursion. Usually, other calculations or procedures are done before the recursive call.\n<\/p>\n<p>A tail recursion usually occurs when a recursive function call is made, then ends, and has nothing else to do after having done the recursive call. The benefits of this approach include less burden of retaining a stack frame, as well as code readability. Programmers and designers sometimes use tail recursion in order to optimize code and maximize efficiency.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What Does Tail Recursion Mean? Tail recursion is the act of calling a recursive function at the end of a particular code module rather than in the middle. A function is recursive if it calls itself. This programming concept is often useful for self-referencing functions and plays a major role in programming languages such as [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7813,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"definitioncat":[241,216],"class_list":["post-9878","definition","type-definition","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","definitioncat-computer-science","definitioncat-software-development"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v23.8 (Yoast SEO v23.8) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>What is Tail Recursion? - Definition from Techopedia<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"This definition explains the meaning of Tail Recursion and why it matters.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Tail Recursion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"This definition explains the meaning of Tail Recursion and why it matters.\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Techopedia\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/techopedia\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2017-05-19T11:26:23+00:00\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@techopedia\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"1 minute\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Margaret Rouse\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/#\/schema\/person\/f5dd538e31ee352d105b8af36c4268a5\"},\"headline\":\"Tail Recursion\",\"datePublished\":\"2014-12-15T17:04:15+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2017-05-19T11:26:23+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion\"},\"wordCount\":163,\"commentCount\":0,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/#organization\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion#respond\"]}],\"articleSection\":\"\"},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.techopedia.com\/definition\/22460\/tail-recursion\",\"name\":\"What is Tail Recursion? 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