Lua VS Wasm benchmarks

Current benchmark data was generated on Sun Jul 13 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
wasm 5.rs 1739ms 5.1ms 34.0MB 1720ms 7ms wasmtime 34.0.1
wasm 4.rs 1815ms 23ms 34.1MB 1793ms 10ms wasmtime 34.0.1
wasm 3.rs 1852ms 9.2ms 50.0MB 1823ms 17ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua 3544ms 45ms 172.9MB 3407ms 123ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 104.9MB 4947ms 40ms lua 5.4.7

Input: 15

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
wasm 5.rs 171ms 1.3ms 20.0MB 157ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
wasm 4.rs 174ms 3.1ms 20.0MB 163ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
wasm 3.rs 180ms 3.2ms 22.0MB 163ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua 290ms 5.5ms 15.7MB 267ms 10ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 814ms 5.2ms 16.9MB 797ms 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 1.4ms 0.2ms 2.4MB 0ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 1.4ms 0.2ms 2.1MB 0ms 0ms lua 5.4.7
wasm 1.rs 6.7ms 0.5ms 18.2MB 0ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1

merkletrees

Input: 17

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
wasm 1.rs 870ms 7.8ms 42.1MB 847ms 10ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 107.4MB 4950ms 33ms lua 5.4.7
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 149.3MB 4933ms 57ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3

Input: 15

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
wasm 1.rs 192ms 2.6ms 24.1MB 177ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua 1101ms 2.2ms 31.1MB 1073ms 17ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 2187ms 8.5ms 28.6MB 2170ms 3ms lua 5.4.7

nbody

Input: 5000000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
wasm 1.rs 405ms 1.9ms 18.0MB 390ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
wasm 2.rs 564ms 4.6ms 18.1MB 553ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 4.lua 713ms 3.7ms 2.3MB 703ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
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
wasm 1.rs 47ms 0.1ms 18.1MB 37ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
wasm 2.rs 65ms 1.7ms 18.1MB 50ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 4.lua 74ms 0.9ms 2.3MB 67ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 4.lua 1154ms 10ms 2.3MB 1143ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

spectral-norm

Input: 8000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
wasm 2.rs 3597ms 3.4ms 17.7MB 3583ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua 4063ms 4.0ms 2.5MB 4053ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
wasm 7.rs 4892ms 1.4ms 19.8MB 4880ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 2.5MB 4990ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

Input: 4000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
wasm 2.rs 906ms 1.0ms 18.3MB 893ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua 1029ms 1.6ms 2.4MB 1020ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
wasm 7.rs 1231ms 2.6ms 17.7MB 1217ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
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
wasm 2.rs 234ms 0.9ms 17.8MB 220ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua 257ms 0.3ms 2.3MB 250ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
wasm 7.rs 314ms 0.5ms 18.1MB 300ms 0ms wasmtime 34.0.1
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 2.1MB 4990ms 0ms lua 5.4.7