Yeah, zstd is awesome. I built a webapp that uses it via wasm and the decompress...

cgio · 2026-09-22T10:46:30 1790073990

Lzma. I did a simple test, same payload repeated with a gap. Lzma ruled it.

|gap |gzip |bz2 |lzma | |---------|----------|-----|--------| |0 |2.7% |18.9%|*0.9%*| |8 KB |2.4% |17.8%|0.9% | |*40 KB*|*94.4%* |17.7%|0.4% | |1 MB |*104.3%*|19.7%|*0.9%*|

notpushkin · 2026-09-22T12:38:14 1790080694

HN doesn’t support Markdown tables. You can prepend two spaces to show it in monospace though.

I don’t see zstd in your comparison?

Sweepi · 2026-09-22T13:46:47 1790084807

dont know the point of the table, but here it is:

  |gap      |gzip      |bz2  |lzma    | 
  |---------|----------|-----|--------|
  |0        |2.7%      |18.9%|  *0.9%*| 
  |8 KB     |2.4%      |17.8%|   0.9% |
  |*40 KB*  |*94.4%*   |17.7%|   0.4% |
  |1 MB     |*104.3%*  |19.7%|  *0.9%*|

gcr · 2026-09-23T02:28:28 1790130508

seconding others' request to try with zstd! I'd be very curious what something like zstd -14 would give you

cgio · 2026-09-23T08:52:52 1790153572

Good point. Looks like it’s related to window size (incl for lzma btw). Lzma stays 0.9 and goes to 88.5 post 8.8M gap. Zstd -14 is close to lzma up to 4.4M where it jumps to 91.5. 14L seems to be the best overall for this scenario staying at 1.9.