Benchmark 2025: Kotlin vs Competitors — Who is Faster and More Convenient

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Benchmark 2025: Kotlin vs competitors — results that surprise

At the beginning of 2025, the pythonlib.ru team conducted a large-scale testing of popular programming languages to answer the main question: how good is Kotlin compared to its direct competitors? The benchmark included Java, Go, Rust, and Python. The tests were performed on identical hardware (AMD Ryzen 9, 32 GB RAM, SSD NVMe) under identical conditions.

We evaluated three key parameters:

Execution speed (processing time for 10 million iterations of a CPU-intensive task);
Memory consumption (peak RSS value);
Development speed (time to write and debug a typical microservice).

Performance: Kotlin in the top three

In terms of raw performance, Kotlin (JVM) showed excellent results, taking 3rd place after Rust and Go. The gap from Rust was only 12%, and from Go 8%. At the same time, Kotlin outperformed Java by 5% thanks to improved compilation in Kotlin 2.1 and optimizations of the K2 compiler. Python, as expected, turned out to be 8-10 times slower.

The results of Kotlin Native (K/N) were especially impressive — in JVM-free mode, it showed performance comparable to Go, making it an excellent choice for cross-platform and native applications.

Memory consumption: an unexpected compromise

Here, Rust (minimal consumption) and Go took the lead. Kotlin on JVM predictably consumes more memory — on average 30-40% more than Go, but 15% less than standard Java with Spring Boot. Kotlin Native narrowed the gap to 10% from Rust, which was a pleasant surprise.

Rust: 120 MB — absolute leader;
Go: 145 MB;
Kotlin Native: 160 MB;
Kotlin JVM: 210 MB;
Java: 250 MB;
Python: 280 MB.

Development speed: Kotlin is unrivaled

Here, Kotlin outperformed all competitors. Thanks to its concise syntax, null-safety, and powerful extension functions, developers wrote a typical CRUD microservice in Kotlin in an average of 4.5 hours. For comparison:

Python: 5 hours (fast, but more runtime errors);
Go: 6 hours (lots of boilerplate code);
Java: 7 hours (verbose syntax);
Rust: 9 hours (high entry barrier, complex borrow checker).

Results: is Kotlin worth choosing in 2025?

Kotlin confidently occupies the sweet spot. It is not the fastest (losing to Rust and Go), but also not the slowest (outpacing Java and Python). In terms of the "development speed / performance" ratio, Kotlin is the optimal choice for backend, Android, and cross-platform applications.

If your project requires maximum performance and minimal memory consumption, choose