Benchmarking

Overview of some CLI tools for benchmarking

Updated: 30 May 2025

Hyperfine

Hyperfine is a command line benchmarking tool that’s pretty straightforward. Using it looks like this:

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hyperfine [...flags] <...commands>

It can be used to benchmark any number of commands

Basic Run

A simple benchmark of some commands can be seen below:

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hyperfine 'npm install' 'yarn install' 'pnpm install'

Warming Up

Warmup runs can be added using --warmup <count as follows:

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hyperfine --warmup 3 'npm install' 'yarn install' 'pnpm install'

Parameterized Run

The -L flag can be use to add a parameter, for example the above benchmark can also be done like so:

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hyperfine -L pkg npm,yarn,pnpm '{pkg} install'

Flags

It also has some flags, the following of which I think are useful:

  • --warmup <count> the number of warmup iterations
  • -i/--ignore-failure ignores errors
  • -s <shell>/--shell <shell> sets the shell to use for running commands
  • -L <param> <comma separated values>/--parameter-list provides a way to specify params
  • --parameter-scan <param> <from> <to> -D <diff> makes it possible to provide a range for params