Inside an async block, the await keyword stands for then/flatMap/bind. Using multiple awaits is the same as a chain of then/flatMap/bind, or the do-notation in

Inside an async block, the await keyword stands for then/flatMap/bind. Using multiple awaits is the same as a chain of then/flatMap/bind, or the do-notation in Haskell. async { const a = await getA(); const b = await getB(a); return await getC(b); } Is the same as: getA().then((a) => getB(a)).then((b) => getC(b)); Observable is interesting, because it has multiple flatMap variations, like concatMap, switchMap etc. There could be different await keywords that represent these operators. Example: asyncObservable { const request = await myRequestStream(); const response = switchMap sendRequest(request); return response; } This should be equivalent to: myRequestStream().switchMap((request) => sendRequest(request)) In general, the advantage of this syntax is, that you can work on die values directly, instead of needing to work with the Observable.