Linux kernel 4.15 is 7-9% faster than 4.11

Greg Kroah-Hartman wrote on Google+:

“From an email thread forwarded to me about one Linux user benchmarking recent kernel versions on a specific network-heavy load:

“4.15 is 7-9% faster than 4.11”
“Turning kpti on makes 4.15 1-2% slower than 4.11”

So, overall, we are right back where we started from. Which makes me feel good, the recent Meltdown changes turn out to not really be much of a problem overall.

Although those developers who worked so hard to get that 7-9% increase over the past year might not be all happy, this should help put to rest the gloom-and-doom reports that various articles are reporting lately.

But if you are stuck at an old kernel version (i.e. 3.10.y, 4.4.y, or 4.9.y or whatever your distro is camping on for the next decade), that’s a totally different story. Go forth and benchmark! Then go update to a newer kernel version, odds are it will be a good improvement.“