Bitonic sort recursively builds bitonic sequences (sequences that first increase then decrease) and merges them. Its regular structure and predictable memory access patterns make it excellent for parallel hardware implementation.
Properties
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Depth (stages) | O(log2 n) |
| Comparators | O(n log2 n) |
| Parallelism | n/2 comparisons per stage |
| Best for | Power-of-2 sizes, GPU/FPGA sorting |