Fastest cpu secs Perl versus PHP Always look at the source code. If the fastest programs are hand-written vector instructions, does the host language matter? You might be more interested in the less optimised programs — more cpu seconds, less gz source code. fannkuch-redux source mem gz cpu PHP #2 12,612 441 190.33 PHP #3 12,624 1160 230.54 PHP #4 47,808 1162 232.59 PHP 12,764 482 237.28 Perl #3 5,064 427 1,267.96 Perl #2 12,308 570 1,626.37 Perl 5,288 457 1,731.08 n-body source mem gz cpu PHP #3 12,372 1082 66.39 Perl #2 6,280 1429 492.03 spectral-norm source mem gz cpu PHP 35,208 1152 27.96 PHP #2 13,444 397 55.81 PHP #3 40,068 1210 60.02 Perl #4 12,044 555 92.70 Perl #5 7,732 340 99.89 Perl 7,708 333 105.24 Perl #2 7,040 343 484.05 Perl #3 18,328 850 498.71 mandelbrot source mem gz cpu PHP 12,664 449 86.95 PHP #3 140,544 875 92.75 Perl 62,064 586 1,883.51 pidigits source mem gz cpu PHP #5 13,728 399 0.92 PHP #4 13,656 389 0.93 PHP #3 13,804 504 0.95 PHP #2 14,172 545 1.46 Perl #4 8,356 261 1.84 Perl #2 8,368 389 1.96 Perl 12,616 463 9.93 PHP 14,912 750 329.76 regex-redux source mem gz cpu PHP 178,712 816 3.66 Perl 205,584 464 21.87 Perl #2 204,960 710 28.74 Perl #3 157,276 854 29.80 Perl #4 157,228 820 29.95 Perl #5 Bad Output fasta source mem gz cpu PHP #3 12,448 1062 20.99 PHP #2 12,696 1050 28.67 Perl 55,124 871 62.41 Perl #4 6,336 966 129.28 Perl #2 6,224 922 198.31 k-nucleotide source mem gz cpu PHP #4 257,260 1079 69.91 Perl #2 659,704 359 131.83 Perl 1,253,716 652 146.30 Perl #4 1,069,344 476 150.18 Perl #3 1,147,148 513 184.94 reverse-complement source mem gz cpu Perl #3 1,495,156 287 6.47 PHP 1,487,780 318 9.64 PHP #3 528,172 446 11.26 PHP #2 1,784,488 281 11.31 binary-trees source mem gz cpu PHP #3 1,561,956 428 51.64 PHP #2 748,408 423 62.27 PHP 748,424 451 62.40 PHP #4 1,558,972 779 62.76 PHP #7 1,589,184 760 64.15 PHP #5 803,212 1040 85.70 PHP #6 802,924 868 90.44 Perl #5 1,048,472 797 209.51 Perl 599,520 395 252.39 Perl #4 2,519,768 761 274.10 Perl #3 2,200,608 648 390.15 Perl This is perl 5, version 34 subversion 0 (v5.34.0) x86_64-linux-thread-multi PHP PHP 8.1.5 (cli) (built: May 5 2022 10:44:00) (NTS) Copyright (c) The PHP Group Zend Engine v4.1.5, Copyright (c) Zend Technologies all Perl programs & measurements all PHP programs & measurements