I have files containing data set which contain 11,000 rows. I have to run a loop through each row, this is taking me 25minutes for each file. I am using following code: z <- read.zoo("Title.txt", tz = "") for(i in seq_along(z[,1])) { if(is.na(coredata(z[i,1]))) next ctr <- i while(ctr < length(z[,1])) { if( ( abs ( coredata(z[i,1]) -coredata(z[ctr+1,1]) ) ) > std_d) { z[ctr+1,1] <- NA ctr <- ctr + 1 } else { break } } } Where Title. txt is file containing 11,000rows. It looks like (first five rows): "timestamp" "mesured_distance" "IFC_Code" "from_sensor_to_river_bottom" "1" "2012-06-03 12:30:07-05" 3188 1005 3500 "2" "2012-06-03 12:15:16-05" 3189 1005 3500 "3" "2012-06-03 12:00:08-05" 3185 1005 3500 "4" "2012-06-03 11:45:11-05" 3191 1005 3500 "5" "2012-06-03 11:30:15-05" 3188 1005 3500 I wish to receive help on how should I increase the speed for this code? Thank you for your consideration.