Does anyone know, or know of a link for the underlying algorithms used for list manipulation functions? Specifically: This question came about as there has been numerous questions that have asked about removing duplicates or some other list manipulation function. Some of the best answers often included usage of GatherBy due to the performance it offers (a few hundred times over DeleteDuplicates in some cases). Related: usages of GatherBy and Union : Checking for duplicates in sublists GatherBy Ordering function with recognition of duplicates GatherBy Gather list elements by labels GatherBy Retrieving duplicates from nested list GatherBy Delete duplicates in a list, depending on the sequence of numbers Union How to delete duplicate solutions of this system of equations? Union Answer This is an incomplete answer; I will continue it tomorrow. Work In Progress: errors may abound. Preamble hat-tip to Leonid For the variations with custom test or ordering functions we can snoop on