Lua versus Node js fastest programs Always look at the source code. These are only the fastest programs. Do some of them use manually vectorized SIMD? Look at the other programs. They may seem more-like a fair comparison to you. regex-redux source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 2.57 326,464 482 2.61 1% 100% 1% 0% Node js 4.64 1,163,148 668 5.83 3% 14% 30% 79% binary-trees source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 48.15 923,628 664 178.89 97% 92% 91% 91% Node js 7.52 1,343,968 744 22.37 73% 70% 85% 69% k-nucleotide source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 114.82 596,536 613 115.62 0% 100% 0% 0% Node js 15.68 397,548 1812 44.40 82% 95% 44% 62% fasta source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 25.72 2,840 1061 25.76 100% 0% 0% 0% Node js 1.89 71,820 2047 6.13 79% 79% 81% 85% reverse-complement source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 40.62 2,654,732 553 41.04 0% 100% 1% 0% Node js 2.17 1,535,512 1480 4.64 62% 53% 56% 42% n-body source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 208.01 1,240 1305 208.83 0% 0% 100% 0% Node js 8.63 36,136 1268 8.67 0% 0% 100% 0% mandelbrot source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 113.06 18,572 623 394.49 86% 100% 77% 86% Node js 4.03 95,448 1122 15.91 99% 98% 99% 100% fannkuch-redux source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 526.61 1,296 462 534.49 0% 0% 1% 100% Node js 11.60 64,024 1313 45.89 99% 99% 99% 99% spectral-norm source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua 79.73 2,780 329 79.91 0% 0% 100% 0% Node js 1.64 67,584 999 6.12 92% 92% 93% 95% pidigits source secs mem gz busy cpu load Lua Failed Node js 1.29 37,068 599 1.36 1% 100% 2% 2% Lua Lua 5.4.2 Copyright (C) 1994-2020 Lua.org, PUC-Rio Node js v16.3.0 all Lua programs & measurements all Node js programs & measurements