OCaml VS Lua 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
ocaml 1.ml 3087ms 52ms 157.2MB 3003ms 70ms ocaml 5.3.0
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
ocaml 1.ml 221ms 1.6ms 19.1MB 207ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0
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

fannkuch-redux

Input: 11

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 2.ml 2909ms 4.1ms 4.9MB 2903ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

Input: 10

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 2.ml 245ms 0.8ms 5.2MB 237ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

fasta

Input: 2500000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 6.ml 346ms 1.9ms 24.8MB 330ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

Input: 250000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 6.ml 39ms 0.7ms 7.4MB 30ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

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
ocaml 1.ml 1.8ms 0.1ms 5.0MB 0ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

lru

Input: 1000 1000000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 1.ml 173ms 2.7ms 6.4MB 163ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

Input: 1000 3000000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 1.ml 532ms 18ms 6.6MB 520ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

Input: 100 500000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 1.ml 78ms 0.4ms 6.2MB 70ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

merkletrees

Input: 17

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 1.ml 1077ms 22ms 70.2MB 1037ms 27ms ocaml 5.3.0
ocaml 2.ml 2068ms 35ms 91.8MB 2017ms 37ms ocaml 5.3.0
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
ocaml 1.ml 144ms 1.4ms 21.7MB 127ms 3ms ocaml 5.3.0
ocaml 2.ml 359ms 6.4ms 27.7MB 340ms 7ms ocaml 5.3.0
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
ocaml 1.ml 374ms 2.6ms 5.2MB 367ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0
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
ocaml 1.ml 40ms 0.1ms 5.2MB 30ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0
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

nsieve

Input: 12

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 1.ml 945ms 11ms 547.9MB 883ms 47ms ocaml 5.3.0
ocaml 2.ml 1884ms 7.1ms 17.2MB 1870ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

Input: 10

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 1.ml 178ms 0.8ms 142.3MB 153ms 10ms ocaml 5.3.0
ocaml 2.ml 464ms 1.5ms 9.3MB 453ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0

regex-redux

Input: 2500000_in

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 2.ml timeout 0.0ms 462.9MB 4830ms 157ms ocaml 5.3.0

Input: 250000_in

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
ocaml 2.ml 542ms 2.0ms 57.1MB 510ms 17ms ocaml 5.3.0

spectral-norm

Input: 8000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
lua 1.lua 4063ms 4.0ms 2.5MB 4053ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
ocaml 2.ml 4558ms 6.5ms 6.3MB 4543ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0
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
lua 1.lua 1029ms 1.6ms 2.4MB 1020ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
ocaml 2.ml 1146ms 5.3ms 6.1MB 1137ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0
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 257ms 0.3ms 2.3MB 250ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
ocaml 2.ml 296ms 9.1ms 5.2MB 287ms 0ms ocaml 5.3.0
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 2.1MB 4990ms 0ms lua 5.4.7