Programming Language and compiler
Benchmarks

Zig VS Lua benchmarks

Current benchmark data was generated on Fri Aug 01 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
zig 1.zig 1735ms 12ms 49.0MB 1707ms 13ms zig 0.14.1
lua 1.lua 3513ms 23ms 173.0MB 3370ms 130ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 105.0MB 4950ms 37ms lua 5.4.7

Input: 15

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 150ms 1.6ms 7.0MB 140ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
lua 1.lua 290ms 1.7ms 15.9MB 270ms 7ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 817ms 0.3ms 17.0MB 800ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

edigits

Input: 250001

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 2263ms 4.3ms 2.5MB 2233ms 10ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 100000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 379ms 2.3ms 1.9MB 363ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

fannkuch-redux

Input: 11

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 2-m.zig 639ms 3.6ms 1.4MB 2410ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 3-i.zig 1763ms 1.4ms 1.0MB 1753ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 1.zig 2716ms 2.1ms 1.0MB 2707ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 10

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 2-m.zig 59ms 0.3ms 1.4MB 200ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 3-i.zig 147ms 0.4ms 1.0MB 140ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 1.zig 229ms 0.3ms 1.0MB 220ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

fasta

Input: 2500000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 89ms 0.7ms 1.0MB 80ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 250000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 11ms 0.7ms 1.0MB 0ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

helloworld

Input: QwQ

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 0.9ms 0.0ms 1.1MB 0ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
lua 1.lua 1.4ms 0.1ms 2.4MB 0ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 1.4ms 0.2ms 2.1MB 0ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

knucleotide

Input: 2500000_in

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1-m.zig 317ms 5.6ms 67.2MB 830ms 27ms zig 0.14.1
zig 1.zig 501ms 8.6ms 28.1MB 480ms 7ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 250000_in

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1-m.zig 63ms 0.7ms 54.3MB 127ms 30ms zig 0.14.1
zig 1.zig 67ms 2.5ms 15.4MB 50ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

lru

Input: 1000 1000000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 33ms 1.4ms 2.8MB 23ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 1000 3000000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 94ms 3.0ms 2.8MB 87ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 100 500000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 15ms 0.5ms 1.3MB 10ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

mandelbrot

Input: 5000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 248ms 0.3ms 4.1MB 240ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 1000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 12ms 0.1ms 1.1MB 0ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

merkletrees

Input: 17

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 860ms 0.1ms 41.0MB 830ms 13ms zig 0.14.1
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 107.4MB 4947ms 40ms 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
zig 1.zig 179ms 1.9ms 11.0MB 163ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
lua 1.lua 1101ms 8.1ms 31.1MB 1073ms 17ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua 2192ms 63ms 28.8MB 2170ms 10ms lua 5.4.7

nbody

Input: 5000000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 3.zig 198ms 0.5ms 1.0MB 190ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 2.zig 279ms 0.5ms 1.0MB 270ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 1.zig 315ms 0.9ms 1.1MB 310ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
lua 4.lua 711ms 0.9ms 2.4MB 700ms 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
zig 3.zig 22ms 0.4ms 1.0MB 10ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 2.zig 30ms 0.1ms 1.0MB 20ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 1.zig 33ms 0.3ms 1.1MB 30ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
lua 4.lua 77ms 1.2ms 2.3MB 70ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 4.lua 1145ms 12ms 2.3MB 1137ms 0ms lua 5.4.7

nsieve

Input: 12

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 267ms 6.8ms 40.2MB 250ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 2.zig 328ms 0.3ms 6.0MB 320ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 10

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 55ms 1.6ms 10.9MB 43ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
zig 2.zig 81ms 1.3ms 2.3MB 70ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

pidigits

Input: 8000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 2446ms 4.8ms 2.2MB 2420ms 10ms zig 0.14.1

Input: 4000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 570ms 5.8ms 1.8MB 563ms 0ms zig 0.14.1

spectral-norm

Input: 8000

lang code time stddev peak-mem mem time(user) time(sys) compiler compiler/runtime
zig 1.zig 3687ms 4.1ms 1.4MB 3677ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
lua 1.lua 4064ms 5.2ms 2.5MB 4053ms 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
zig 1.zig 928ms 2.8ms 1.3MB 920ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
lua 1.lua 1018ms 0.4ms 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
zig 1.zig 232ms 0.3ms 1.3MB 220ms 0ms zig 0.14.1
lua 1.lua 258ms 0.6ms 2.3MB 250ms 0ms luajit 2.1.0-beta3
lua 1.lua timeout 0.0ms 2.1MB 4990ms 0ms lua 5.4.7