GCC 6.1 vs. LLVM Clang 3.9 Compiler Performance

The results were close between the two compilers for FLAC audio encoding while GCC 6.1 pulled out ahead for the MP3 encoding test via LAME.

The results were very close with the PostgreSQL database server benchmark.

Redis built under GCC and LLVM/Clang was also performing similarly.

Overall, with the latest versions of GCC and LLVM Clang, the compiler race is quite heated. Clang tends to perform very well against GCC for many of the C/C++ workloads out there, but in some areas the GNU Compiler Collection remains ahead while in others Clang is able to yield a striking win. Clang though is still leading over GCC when it comes to faster compile times. It really depends upon your particular workloads and what features/functionality are important to you outside of runtime performance in deciding between using GCC and Clang. Stay tuned for more tests shortly of these fresh open-source compilers.