jQuery object: to cache or not to cache?

It is always better to cache the element, if n is greater than 1, cache the element, or chain the operations together (you can do $('#something').something().somethingelse(); for most jQuery operations, since they usually return the wrapped set itself). As an aside, it has become a bit of a standard to name cache variables beginning with a money sign $ so that later in the code it is evident that you are performing an operation on a jQuery set. So you will see a lot of people do var $content = $('#content'); then $content.find('...'); later on.

The second is superior. Most importantly, it is cleaner. In the future, if you want to change your selector, you only need to change it one place. Else you need to change it in N places.

Secondly, it should perform better, although a user would only notice for particularly heavy dom, or if you were invoking that function a lot.

If you look at this question from a different perspective, the correct answer is obvious.

In the first case, you're duplicating the selection logic in every place it appears. If you change the name of the element, you have to change each occurence. This should be reason enough to not do it. Now you have two options - either you cache the element's selector or the element itself. Using the element as an object makes more sense than using the name.

Performance-wise, I think the effect is negligible. Probably you'll be able to find test results for this particular use-case: caching jQuery objects vs always re-selecting them. Performance might become an issue if you have a large DOM and do a lot of lookups, but you need to see for yourself if that's the case.

If you want to see exactly how much memory your objects are taking up, you can use the Chrome Heap Profiler and check there. I don't know if similar tools are available for other browsers and probably the implementations will vary wildly in performance, especially in IE's case, but it may satisfy your curiosity.

IMO, you should use the second variant, storing the result of the selection in an object, no so much as to improve performance but to have as little duplicate logic as possible.

As for caching $(this), I agree with Nick Craver's answer. As he said there, you should also use chaining where possible - cleans up your code and solves your problem.