Programming Language and compiler
Benchmarks

Lua VS Javascript benchmarks

Current benchmark data was generated on Mon Mar 31 2025, full log can be found HERE

CONTRIBUTIONS are WELCOME!

[x86_64][4 cores] AMD EPYC 7763 64-Core Processor (Model 1)

* -m in a file name stands for multi-threading or multi-processing

* -i in a file name stands for direct intrinsics usage. (Usage of simd intrinsics via libraries is not counted)

* -ffi in a file name stands for non-stdlib FFI usage

* (You may find time < time(user) + time(sys) for some non-parallelized programs, the overhead is from GC or JIT compiler, which are allowed to take advantage of multi-cores as that's more close to real-world scenarios.)

binarytrees

Input: 18

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
javascript 1-m.js 1005ms 34ms 179.3MB 1543ms 267ms bun 1.2.7
javascript 1-m.js 1224ms 3.5ms 250.8MB 2130ms 153ms node 23.10.0
lua 1.lua 3623ms 23ms 173.0MB 3477ms 133ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 104.9MB 4953ms 33ms lua 5.4.7

Input: 15

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
javascript 1.js 100ms 0.5ms 79.1MB 73ms 27ms bun 1.2.7
javascript 1.js 126ms 0.7ms 78.8MB 130ms 23ms node 23.10.0
lua 1.lua 292ms 3.1ms 15.9MB 267ms 10ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 824ms 5.5ms 16.9MB 807ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

helloworld

Input: QwQ

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
lua 1.lua 1.5ms 0.2ms 2.3MB 0ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 1.6ms 0.1ms 2.1MB 0ms 0ms lua 5.4.7
javascript 1.js 13ms 0.3ms 33.3MB 0ms 0ms bun 1.2.7
javascript 1.js 31ms 0.3ms 47.9MB 18ms 2ms node 23.10.0

merkletrees

Input: 17

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
javascript 1-m.js 479ms 7.3ms 152.6MB 623ms 137ms bun 1.2.7
javascript 1.js 530ms 2.1ms 130.6MB 613ms 57ms node 23.10.0
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 107.4MB 4947ms 37ms lua 5.4.7
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 149.4MB 4923ms 63ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3

Input: 15

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
javascript 1.js 116ms 2.3ms 88.1MB 103ms 33ms bun 1.2.7
javascript 1.js 160ms 2.0ms 98.4MB 163ms 33ms node 23.10.0
lua 1.lua 1392ms 85ms 31.1MB 1360ms 13ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 2291ms 16ms 28.6MB 2270ms 10ms lua 5.4.7

nbody

Input: 5000000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
javascript 6.js 458ms 4.1ms 55.9MB 447ms 10ms node 23.10.0
lua 4.lua 713ms 1.8ms 2.3MB 703ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
javascript 6.js 780ms 18ms 46.1MB 773ms 0ms bun 1.2.7
lua 4.lua timeout 0.0ms 2.3MB 4990ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

Input: 500000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
lua 4.lua 75ms 1.1ms 2.4MB 70ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
javascript 6.js 79ms 1.0ms 56.2MB 67ms 10ms node 23.10.0
javascript 6.js 98ms 1.2ms 46.3MB 93ms 7ms bun 1.2.7
lua 4.lua 1112ms 26ms 2.3MB 1103ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

spectral-norm

Input: 8000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
javascript 6-m.js 2181ms 15ms 114.1MB 8247ms 60ms node 23.10.0
lua 1.lua 4068ms 9.8ms 2.5MB 4057ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 2.4MB 4990ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

Input: 4000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
javascript 6-m.js 656ms 7.6ms 113.5MB 2320ms 53ms node 23.10.0
lua 1.lua 1021ms 2.2ms 2.4MB 1010ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 2.1MB 4990ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

Input: 2000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
lua 1.lua 261ms 2.8ms 2.3MB 250ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
javascript 6-m.js 266ms 1.5ms 109.7MB 813ms 50ms node 23.10.0
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 2.0MB 4990ms 0ms lua 5.4.7