Why Java is Slow

Posted November 27, 2005 * Comments(5)

I asked a few post ago why Java is still slow despite the papers claiming technically it should be as fast or faster than C. Here is a page that claims to explain why, and why it will remain so. I can’t say I’m smart enough in these topics to know who is right, but I know what I see – Java is still slow.

Update: And here is James Gosling commenting on the same thread, basically saying Java is now as fast as C, faster than GCC. Hmm. Would love to believe that. Perhaps I just need to add “-server” to my optimizations and suddenly I’ll get a 5x performance improvement. Hmm.

5 Comments so far

  1. Dweller on August 6th, 2006

    The day that the JVM (Java Virtual Machine) runs faster than the language that its implemented in is the day that I will write a C/C++ compiler that produces bytecode.

    Let us consider what keystone operating systems are writen in:-
    C/C++ (MacOS, Windows,WinCE, Symbian, Linux, Solaris etc.)
    Java (None)

    Since no key or critical applications are writen in Java I must continue to assume it’s yet another “toy” scripting language.

  2. Someone on October 14th, 2006

    The Java interpreter takes a significant length of time to load, even if Java can run as fast as native code.

  3. Java Vs. C/C++ - when speed is an issue | BiffSocko.com on November 28th, 2008

    [...] http://parand.com/say/index.php/2005/11/27/why-java-is-slow/ [...]

  4. CS Graduate on January 21st, 2009

    “Someone” is an idiot, they need to read “Dweller’s” comment.

  5. Rishi Mehta on November 8th, 2009

    Java performs ByteCode Verification.That’s why the java is slow.

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