Gas optimisation: maximum of two numbers

Question

Any ideas if I can optimize the gas of the following function from Math library of OZ:

function max(uint256 a, uint256 b) public pure returns (uint256) {
    return a >= b ? a : b;
}

*I checked all possible gas optimization patterns but still no answer. Personally, it is already as optimized as possible.

Answer 1

Just playing around, but it seems that this version is slightly more gas efficient :

function max(uint256 a, uint256 b) public pure returns (uint256 result) {
   assembly {
     let tmp := gt(a, b)
     result := add(mul(tmp, a), mul(sub(1, tmp), b))
   }
}

Which basically reworks the branches into a single arithmetic expression. Your original ternary version uses 21666 gas (a > b) or 21676 gas (b > a) on default settings, giving an average gas cost of 21671, while this one uses a constant 21645 gas.

The improvement is marginal at best and doesn't justify the loss of readability of assembly in my opinion...