The fact is that recursion is rarely the most efficient approach to solving a problem, and iteration is almost always more efficient. This is because there is usually more overhead associated with making recursive calls due to the fact that the call stack is so heavily used during recursion.

Is recursive faster than iterative?

The recursive function runs much faster than the iterative one. The reason is because in the latter, for each item, a CALL to the function st_push is needed and then another to st_pop . In the former, you only have the recursive CALL for each node.

Why is iterative solution better than recursive?

An Iterative algorithm will be faster than the Recursive algorithm because of overheads like calling functions and registering stacks repeatedly. Many times the recursive algorithms are not efficient as they take more space and time.