Comparative performance analysis of ram compression algorithms (LZ4, ZSTD, LZO) for resource-constrained systems

Abstract

This paper presents a comprehensive experimental study of the efficiency of RAM compression algorithms LZ4, Zstd (levels 1–5), and LZO on three hardware platforms (x86-64, ARM Cortex-A72, KVM) under various workload types. An integral efficiency metric with scenario-specific weighting coefficients is developed. LZ4 is found to be optimal for OLTP workloads, while Zstd level 3 is best suited for office scenarios and maximizing effective memory capacity. On ARM platforms, the relative advantage of LZ4 increases due to limited CPU performance.