Perl versus PHP fastest programs Always look at the source code. These are only the fastest programs. Look at the other programs. They may seem more-like a fair comparison to you. reverse-complement source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 6.36 1,495,132 287 6.52 0% 0% 2% 100% PHP 7.06 534,336 446 11.90 14% 49% 40% 65% k-nucleotide source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 37.72 1,255,884 652 131.45 88% 89% 87% 85% PHP 20.15 254,792 1079 69.22 91% 96% 80% 76% pidigits source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 1.90 8,268 261 2.16 100% 2% 3% 9% PHP 0.91 13,196 399 0.96 2% 0% 3% 100% fasta source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 58.08 55,188 871 59.16 1% 100% 1% 0% PHP 22.82 12,356 1062 24.32 3% 2% 2% 100% binary-trees source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 53.02 1,048,568 797 195.75 91% 88% 100% 90% PHP 18.64 1,588,704 760 67.29 89% 90% 96% 86% spectral-norm source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 24.69 12,188 555 96.59 97% 99% 98% 97% PHP 7.51 35,364 1152 29.55 99% 98% 98% 98% n-body source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 419.75 6,388 1429 429.50 1% 1% 1% 100% PHP 71.75 12,072 1082 76.86 3% 1% 2% 100% regex-redux source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 10.10 157,208 820 31.98 96% 67% 93% 61% PHP 1.73 162,348 816 3.58 37% 88% 44% 39% fannkuch-redux source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 392.54 12,116 570 1,568.84 100% 100% 100% 100% PHP 63.18 44,168 1160 250.98 99% 99% 100% 99% mandelbrot source secs mem gz busy cpu load Perl 542.82 45,036 586 2,169.30 100% 100% 100% 100% PHP 24.89 135,480 875 99.12 100% 100% 99% 100% Perl This is perl 5, version 32, subversion 0 (v5.32.0) built for x86_64-linux-thread-multi PHP PHP 8.0.0 (cli) (built: Nov 26 2020 09:02:29) ( NTS ) Copyright (c) The PHP Group Zend Engine v4.0.0-dev, Copyright (c) Zend Technologies all Perl programs & measurements all PHP programs & measurements