Perry

One codebase. Every platform. Native performance.

Perry is a native TypeScript compiler written in Rust. It takes your TypeScript and compiles it straight to native executables — no Node.js, no Electron, no browser engine. Just fast, small binaries that run anywhere.

Current Version: 0.4.14 | Website | Documentation | Showcase

perry compile src/main.ts -o myapp
./myapp    # that's it — a standalone native binary

Perry uses SWC for TypeScript parsing and Cranelift for native code generation. The output is a single binary with no runtime dependencies.

Built with Perry

People are building real apps with Perry today. Here are some highlights:

Project	What it is	Platforms
Bloom Engine	Native TypeScript game engine — Metal, DirectX 12, Vulkan, OpenGL. Write games in TS, ship native.	macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS, tvOS, Android
Mango	Native MongoDB GUI. ~7 MB binary, <100 MB RAM, sub-second cold start.	macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS, Android
Hone	AI-powered native code editor with built-in terminal, Git, and LSP.	macOS, Windows, Linux, iOS, Android, Web
Pry	Fast, native JSON viewer with tree navigation and search.	macOS, iOS, Android
dB Meter	Real-time sound level measurement with 60fps updates and per-device calibration.	iOS, macOS, Android

Have something you've built with Perry? Open a PR to add it here!

Performance

Median of 3 runs on macOS ARM64 (Apple Silicon). Node.js v25, Bun 1.3.

Perry wins — function calls, recursion, array access:

Benchmark	Perry	Node.js	Bun	vs Node	vs Bun	What it tests
fibonacci(40)	505ms	1,025ms	538ms	2.0x	1.1x	Recursive function calls
array_read	4ms	14ms	18ms	3.5x	4.5x	Sequential memory access (10M elements)
object_create	5ms	9ms	7ms	1.8x	1.4x	Object allocation + field access (1M objects)

Perry compiles to native machine code — no JIT warmup, no interpreter overhead. Function calls, recursion, and sequential memory access patterns are direct native instructions.

Competitive — within 2x of JIT runtimes:

Benchmark	Perry	Node.js	Bun	vs Node	vs Bun	What it tests
method_calls	16ms	11ms	9ms	0.7x	0.6x	Class method dispatch (10M calls)
prime_sieve	11ms	8ms	7ms	0.7x	0.6x	Sieve of Eratosthenes (boolean array + branches)
string_concat	7ms	2ms	1ms	0.3x	0.1x	100K string appends (in-place with capacity)

Method dispatch uses direct function calls (no vtable). String concatenation uses amortized O(1) in-place appending. V8/JSC have inline caches and rope strings that push these faster.

V8/Bun lead — f64 math, SIMD-vectorizable loops:

Benchmark	Perry	Node.js	Bun	vs Node	vs Bun	Why they're faster
mandelbrot	71ms	25ms	31ms	0.3x	0.4x	V8 TurboFan schedules f64 ops across 2 FPUs more aggressively than Cranelift
matrix_multiply	61ms	36ms	36ms	0.6x	0.6x	V8 auto-vectorizes nested loops with SIMD (NEON on ARM)
math_intensive	370ms	52ms	53ms	0.1x	0.1x	Harmonic series: V8 vectorizes `result += 1.0/i` across SIMD lanes
nested_loops	32ms	18ms	20ms	0.6x	0.6x	V8's loop optimization + SIMD for array access in nested loops

V8's TurboFan JIT has decades of optimization for tight f64 loops — SIMD auto-vectorization (NEON/SSE), speculative type specialization, and aggressive instruction scheduling. Perry's Cranelift backend generates correct scalar code but doesn't yet vectorize. This is the main performance frontier for Perry's codegen.

Run benchmarks yourself: cd benchmarks/suite && ./run_benchmarks.sh (requires node, bun, cargo)

Binary Size

Perry produces small, self-contained binaries with no external dependencies at run time:

Program	Binary Size
`console.log("Hello, world!")`	~330KB
hello world + `fs` / `path` / `process` imports	~380KB
full stdlib app (fastify, mysql2, etc.)	~48MB
with `--enable-js-runtime` (V8 embedded)	+~15MB

Perry automatically detects which parts of the runtime your program uses and only links what's needed.

Installation

macOS (Homebrew)

brew install perryts/perry/perry

Windows (winget)

winget install PerryTS.Perry

Debian / Ubuntu (APT)

curl -fsSL https://perryts.github.io/perry-apt/perry.gpg.pub | sudo gpg --dearmor -o /usr/share/keyrings/perry.gpg
echo "deb [signed-by=/usr/share/keyrings/perry.gpg] https://perryts.github.io/perry-apt stable main" | sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/perry.list
sudo apt update && sudo apt install perry

Quick install (macOS / Linux)

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/PerryTS/perry/main/packaging/install.sh | sh

From source

git clone https://github.com/PerryTS/perry.git
cd perry
cargo build --release
# Binary at: target/release/perry

Requirements

Perry requires a C linker to link compiled executables:

macOS: Xcode Command Line Tools (xcode-select --install)
Linux: GCC or Clang (sudo apt install build-essential)
Windows: MSVC (Visual Studio Build Tools)

Run perry doctor to verify your environment.

Quick Start

# Initialize a new project
perry init my-project
cd my-project

# Compile and run
perry compile src/main.ts -o myapp
./myapp

# Or compile and run in one step
perry run .

# Check TypeScript compatibility
perry check src/

# Diagnose environment
perry doctor

Real-World Example: API Server with ESM Modules

Perry supports standard ES module imports and npm packages. Here's a real-world API server with multi-file project structure:

Project layout:

my-api/
├── package.json
├── src/
│   ├── main.ts
│   ├── config.ts
│   └── routes/
│       └── users.ts
└── node_modules/

src/config.ts

export const config = {
  port: 3000,
  dbHost: process.env.DB_HOST || 'localhost',
};

src/routes/users.ts

export function getUsers(): object[] {
  return [
    { id: 1, name: 'Alice' },
    { id: 2, name: 'Bob' },
  ];
}

export function getUserById(id: number): object | undefined {
  return getUsers().find((u: any) => u.id === id);
}

src/main.ts

import fastify from 'fastify';
import { config } from './config';
import { getUsers, getUserById } from './routes/users';

const app = fastify();

app.get('/api/users', async () => {
  return getUsers();
});

app.get('/api/users/:id', async (request) => {
  const { id } = request.params as { id: string };
  return getUserById(parseInt(id));
});

app.listen({ port: config.port }, () => {
  console.log(`Server running on port ${config.port}`);
});

Compile and run:

perry compile src/main.ts -o my-api && ./my-api
# or: perry run .

The output is a standalone binary — no node_modules needed at runtime.

Example Projects

The example-code/ directory contains ready-to-run projects showing Perry in real-world scenarios:

Example	Stack	What it demonstrates
express-postgres	Express + PostgreSQL	Multi-file routes, middleware (CORS, Helmet), connection pooling, error handling
fastify-redis-mysql	Fastify + Redis + MySQL	Rate limiting, caching layer, database queries, dotenv config
hono-mongodb	Hono + MongoDB	Lightweight HTTP framework with document database
nestjs-typeorm	NestJS + TypeORM	Decorator-based architecture, dependency injection
nextjs-prisma	Next.js-style + Prisma	ORM integration, database migrations
koa-redis	Koa + Redis	Middleware composition, session storage
http-server	Raw HTTP	Low-level request handling, routing, JSON APIs
blockchain-demo	Custom	Blockchain implementation in pure TypeScript

Each example has its own package.json and can be compiled with:

cd example-code/fastify-redis-mysql
npm install
perry compile src/index.ts -o server && ./server

Native UI

Perry includes a declarative UI system (perry/ui) that compiles directly to native platform widgets — no WebView, no Electron:

import { App, VStack, HStack, Text, Button, State } from 'perry/ui';

const count = new State(0);

App(
  VStack(
    Text('Counter').fontSize(24).bold(),
    Text('').bindText(count, n => `Count: ${n}`),
    HStack(
      Button('Decrement', () => count.set(count.get() - 1)),
      Button('Increment', () => count.set(count.get() + 1)),
    ),
  ),
  { title: 'My App', width: 400, height: 300 }
);

9 platforms from one codebase:

Platform	Backend	Target Flag
macOS	AppKit (NSView)	(default on macOS)
iOS / iPadOS	UIKit	`--target ios` / `--target ios-simulator`
tvOS	UIKit	`--target tvos` / `--target tvos-simulator`
watchOS	WatchKit	`--target watchos` / `--target watchos-simulator`
Android	Android Views (JNI)	`--target android`
Windows	Win32	(default on Windows)
Linux	GTK4	(default on Linux)
Web	DOM (JS codegen)	`--target web`
WebAssembly	DOM (WASM)	`--target wasm`

127+ UI functions — widgets (Button, Text, TextField, Toggle, Slider, Picker, Table, Canvas, Image, ProgressView, SecureField, NavigationStack, ZStack, LazyVStack, Form/Section, CameraView), layouts (VStack, HStack), and system APIs (keychain, notifications, file dialogs, clipboard, dark mode, openURL, audio capture).

Multi-Threading

The perry/thread module provides real OS threads with compile-time safety — no shared mutable state, no data races:

import { parallelMap, parallelFilter, spawn } from 'perry/thread';

// Data-parallel array processing across all CPU cores
const results = parallelMap([1, 2, 3, 4, 5], n => fibonacci(n));

// Parallel filtering
const evens = parallelFilter(numbers, n => n % 2 === 0);

// Background thread with Promise
const result = await spawn(() => expensiveComputation());

Values cross threads via deep-copy. Each thread gets its own arena and GC. The compiler enforces that closures don't capture mutable state.

Internationalization (i18n)

Compile-time localization with zero runtime overhead:

import { t, Currency, ShortDate } from 'perry/i18n';

console.log(t('hello'));                    // "Hallo" (German locale)
console.log(t('items', { count: 3 }));     // "3 Artikel" (CLDR plural rules)
console.log(Currency(9.99, 'EUR'));         // "9,99 €"
console.log(ShortDate(Date.now()));        // "24.03.2026"

Configure in perry.toml:

[i18n]
default_locale = "en"
locales = ["en", "de", "fr", "ja"]

All locale strings are baked into the binary at compile time. Native locale detection on all 6 platforms. CLDR plural rules for 30+ locales.

Home Screen Widgets (WidgetKit)

Build native home screen widgets from TypeScript — iOS, Android, watchOS, and Wear OS:

perry compile src/widget.ts --target ios-widget -o MyWidget
perry compile src/widget.ts --target android-widget -o MyWidget
perry compile src/widget.ts --target watchos-widget -o MyWidget
perry compile src/widget.ts --target wearos-tile -o MyWidget

Cross-Platform Targets

# Desktop (default for host platform)
perry compile src/main.ts -o myapp

# Mobile
perry compile src/main.ts --target ios -o MyApp
perry compile src/main.ts --target ios-simulator -o MyApp
perry compile src/main.ts --target android -o MyApp

# TV / Watch
perry compile src/main.ts --target tvos -o MyApp
perry compile src/main.ts --target watchos -o MyApp

# Web
perry compile src/main.ts --target web -o app.html       # JavaScript output
perry compile src/main.ts --target wasm -o app.wasm      # WebAssembly output

# Home screen widgets
perry compile src/widget.ts --target ios-widget -o MyWidget
perry compile src/widget.ts --target android-widget -o MyWidget
perry compile src/widget.ts --target wearos-tile -o MyWidget

Publishing

perry publish macos   # or: ios / android / linux

perry publish sends your TypeScript source to perry-hub (the cloud build server), which cross-compiles and signs for each target platform.

Supported Language Features

Core TypeScript

Feature	Status
Variables (let, const, var)	✅
All operators (+, -, , /, %, *, &, \|, ^, <<, >>, ???, ?., ternary)	✅
Control flow (if/else, for, while, switch, break, continue)	✅
Try-catch-finally, throw	✅
Functions, arrow functions, rest params, defaults	✅
Closures with mutable captures	✅
Classes (inheritance, private fields #, static, getters/setters, super)	✅
Generics (monomorphized at compile time)	✅
Interfaces, type aliases, union types, type guards	✅
Async/await, Promise	✅
Generators (function*)	✅
ES modules (import/export, re-exports, `import * as`)	✅
Destructuring (array, object, rest, defaults, rename)	✅
Spread operator in calls and literals	✅
RegExp (test, match, replace)	✅
BigInt (256-bit)	✅
Decorators	✅

Standard Library

Module	Functions
`console`	log, error, warn, debug
`fs`	readFileSync, writeFileSync, existsSync, mkdirSync, unlinkSync, readdirSync, statSync, readFileBuffer, rmRecursive
`path`	join, dirname, basename, extname, resolve
`process`	env, exit, cwd, argv, uptime, memoryUsage
`JSON`	parse, stringify
`Math`	floor, ceil, round, abs, sqrt, pow, min, max, random, log, sin, cos, tan, PI
`Date`	Date.now(), new Date(), toISOString(), component getters
`crypto`	randomBytes, randomUUID, sha256, md5
`os`	platform, arch, hostname, homedir, tmpdir, totalmem, freemem, uptime, type, release
`Buffer`	from, alloc, allocUnsafe, byteLength, isBuffer, concat; instance methods
`child_process`	execSync, spawnSync, spawnBackground, getProcessStatus, killProcess
`Map`	get, set, has, delete, size, clear, forEach, keys, values, entries
`Set`	add, has, delete, size, clear, forEach
`setTimeout/clearTimeout`	✅
`setInterval/clearInterval`	✅
`worker_threads`	parentPort, workerData

Native npm Package Implementations

These packages are natively implemented in Rust — no Node.js required:

Category	Packages
HTTP	fastify, axios, node-fetch, ws (WebSocket)
Database	mysql2, pg, ioredis
Security	bcrypt, argon2, jsonwebtoken
Utilities	dotenv, uuid, nodemailer, zlib, node-cron

Compiling npm Packages Natively

Perry can compile pure TypeScript/JavaScript npm packages directly to native code instead of routing them through the V8 runtime. Add a perry.compilePackages array to your package.json:

{
  "perry": {
    "compilePackages": [
      "@noble/curves",
      "@noble/hashes",
      "superstruct"
    ]
  }
}

Then compile with --enable-js-runtime as usual. Packages in the list are compiled natively; all others use the V8 runtime.

Good candidates: Pure math/crypto libraries, serialization/encoding, data structures with no I/O. Keep as V8-interpreted: Packages using HTTP/WebSocket, native addons, or unsupported Node.js builtins.

Compiler Optimizations

NaN-Boxing — all values are 64-bit words (f64/u64); no boxing overhead for numbers
Mark-Sweep GC — conservative stack scan, arena block walking, 8-byte GcHeader per alloc
Parallel Compilation — rayon-based module codegen, transform passes, and symbol scanning across CPU cores
FMA / CSE / Loop Unrolling — fused multiply-add, common subexpression elimination, 8x loop unroll
i32 Loop Counters — integer registers for loop variables (no f64 round-trips)
LICM — loop-invariant code motion for nested loops
Shape-Cached Objects — 5-6x faster object allocation
TimSort — O(n log n) hybrid sort for Array.sort()
__platform__ Constant — compile-time platform elimination (dead code removal per target)

Plugin System

Compile TypeScript as a native shared library plugin:

perry compile my-plugin.ts --output-type dylib -o my-plugin.dylib

import { PluginRegistry } from 'perry/plugin';

export function activate(api: any) {
  api.registerTool('my-tool', (args: any) => { /* ... */ });
  api.on('event', (data: any) => { /* ... */ });
}

Testing (Geisterhand)

Perry includes Geisterhand, an in-process UI testing framework with HTTP-driven interaction and screenshot capture:

perry compile src/main.ts --enable-geisterhand -o myapp
./myapp
# UI test server runs on http://localhost:7676

Supports screenshot capture on all native platforms. See the Geisterhand docs for details.

Ecosystem

Package	Description
Bloom Engine	Native TypeScript game engine — 2D/3D rendering, skeletal animation, spatial audio, physics. Metal/DirectX 12/Vulkan/OpenGL.
perry-react	React/JSX that compiles to native widgets. Standard React components → native macOS/iOS/Android app.
perry-sqlite	SQLite with a Prisma-compatible API (`findMany`, `create`, `upsert`, `$transaction`, etc.)
perry-postgres	PostgreSQL with the same Prisma-compatible API
perry-prisma	MySQL with the same Prisma-compatible API
perry-apn	Apple Push Notifications (APNs) native library
@perry/threads	Web Worker parallelism (`parallelMap`, `parallelFilter`, `spawn`) for browser/Node.js
perry-starter	Minimal starter project — get up and running in 30 seconds
perry-demo	Live benchmark dashboard comparing Perry vs Node.js vs Bun
perry-react-dom	Perry React DOM bridge

perry-react

Write React components that compile to native widgets — no DOM, no browser:

import { useState } from 'react';
import { createRoot } from 'react-dom/client';

function Counter() {
  const [n, setN] = useState(0);
  return (
    <div>
      <h1>Count: {n}</h1>
      <button onClick={() => setN(n + 1)}>+</button>
    </div>
  );
}

createRoot(null, { title: 'Counter', width: 300, height: 200 }).render(<Counter />);

perry-sqlite / perry-postgres / perry-prisma

Drop-in replacements for @prisma/client backed by Rust (sqlx):

import { PrismaClient } from 'perry-sqlite';

const prisma = new PrismaClient();
await prisma.$connect();

const users = await prisma.user.findMany({
  where: { email: { contains: '@example.com' } },
  orderBy: { createdAt: 'desc' },
  take: 20,
});

await prisma.$disconnect();

Commands

Command	What it does
`perry compile <input.ts> -o <output>`	Compile TypeScript to a native binary
`perry run <path> [platform]`	Compile and run in one step (supports `ios`, `android`, etc.)
`perry init <name>`	Scaffold a new project
`perry check <path>`	Validate TypeScript compatibility without compiling
`perry publish <platform>`	Build, sign, and publish via the cloud build server
`perry doctor`	Check your development environment
`perry i18n extract`	Extract translatable strings from source

Compiler flags

-o, --output <name>      Output file name
--target <target>        ios | ios-simulator | tvos | tvos-simulator |
                         watchos | watchos-simulator | android |
                         web | wasm | ios-widget | android-widget |
                         wearos-tile | watchos-widget
--output-type <type>     executable | dylib
--enable-js-runtime      Embed V8 for npm package compatibility (+~15MB)
--enable-geisterhand     Enable UI testing server
--print-hir              Print HIR for debugging

Project Structure

perry/
├── crates/
│   ├── perry/                  # CLI (compile, run, check, init, doctor, publish)
│   ├── perry-parser/           # SWC TypeScript parser
│   ├── perry-types/            # Type system
│   ├── perry-hir/              # HIR data structures and AST→HIR lowering
│   ├── perry-transform/        # IR passes (closure conversion, async, inlining)
│   ├── perry-codegen/          # Cranelift native codegen
│   ├── perry-codegen-js/       # JavaScript codegen (--target web)
│   ├── perry-codegen-wasm/     # WebAssembly codegen (--target wasm)
│   ├── perry-codegen-swiftui/  # SwiftUI codegen (iOS/watchOS widgets)
│   ├── perry-codegen-glance/   # Android Glance widget codegen
│   ├── perry-codegen-wear-tiles/ # Wear OS Tiles codegen
│   ├── perry-runtime/          # Runtime (NaN-boxing, GC, arena, strings)
│   ├── perry-stdlib/           # Node.js API support (fastify, mysql2, redis, etc.)
│   ├── perry-ui-*/             # Native UI (macOS, iOS, tvOS, watchOS, Android, GTK4, Windows)
│   ├── perry-ui-geisterhand/   # UI testing framework
│   ├── perry-jsruntime/        # Optional V8 interop via QuickJS
│   └── perry-diagnostics/      # Error reporting
├── docs/                       # Documentation site (mdBook)
├── example-code/               # 8 example applications
├── benchmarks/                 # Benchmark suite (Perry vs Node.js vs Bun)
├── packages/                   # npm packages (@perry/threads)
└── test-files/                 # Test suite

Runtime Characteristics

Garbage Collection — mark-sweep GC with conservative stack scanning, arena block walking, 8-byte GcHeader per allocation
Single-Threaded by Default — async I/O on Tokio workers, callbacks on main thread. Use perry/thread for explicit multi-threading.
No Runtime Type Checking — types erased at compile time. Use typeof and instanceof for runtime checks.
Small Binaries — ~330KB hello world, ~48MB with full stdlib. Automatically stripped.

Development

cargo build --release                                    # Build everything
cargo build --release -p perry-runtime -p perry-stdlib   # Rebuild runtime (after changes)
cargo test --workspace --exclude perry-ui-ios            # Run tests
cargo run --release -- compile file.ts -o out && ./out   # Compile and run
cargo run --release -- compile file.ts --print-hir       # Debug HIR

Adding a new feature

HIR — add node type to crates/perry-hir/src/ir.rs
Lowering — handle AST→HIR in crates/perry-hir/src/lower.rs
Codegen — generate Cranelift IR in crates/perry-codegen/src/codegen.rs
Runtime — add runtime functions in crates/perry-runtime/ if needed
Test — add test-files/test_feature.ts

License

MIT

Name		Name	Last commit message	Last commit date
Latest commit History 522 Commits
.claude		.claude
.github/workflows		.github/workflows
android-build		android-build
benchmarks		benchmarks
crates		crates
docs		docs
example-code		example-code
examples		examples
packages		packages
packaging		packaging
templates/github-actions		templates/github-actions
test-files		test-files
tests		tests
winget-manifests		winget-manifests
.dockerignore		.dockerignore
.gitignore		.gitignore
BUG-STRING-COMPARISON.md		BUG-STRING-COMPARISON.md
CHANGELOG.md		CHANGELOG.md
CLAUDE.md		CLAUDE.md
CNAME		CNAME
Cargo.lock		Cargo.lock
Cargo.toml		Cargo.toml
Dockerfile		Dockerfile
Dockerfile.dev		Dockerfile.dev
FEATURE_AUDIT.md		FEATURE_AUDIT.md
GAPS.md		GAPS.md
LICENSE		LICENSE
OPTIMIZATION_PLAN.md		OPTIMIZATION_PLAN.md
PERRY_UI_IMPLEMENTATION.md		PERRY_UI_IMPLEMENTATION.md
README.md		README.md
UI_ADJSUTMENTS.md		UI_ADJSUTMENTS.md
docker-compose.yml		docker-compose.yml
llms.txt		llms.txt
package-lock.json		package-lock.json
package.json		package.json
run_parity_tests.sh		run_parity_tests.sh
run_tests.sh		run_tests.sh
tiny_test		tiny_test
wasm_test		wasm_test
wasm_ui_demo.html		wasm_ui_demo.html

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Perry

Built with Perry

Performance

Binary Size

Installation

macOS (Homebrew)

Windows (winget)

Debian / Ubuntu (APT)

Quick install (macOS / Linux)

From source

Requirements

Quick Start

Real-World Example: API Server with ESM Modules

Example Projects

Native UI

Multi-Threading

Internationalization (i18n)

Home Screen Widgets (WidgetKit)

Cross-Platform Targets

Publishing

Supported Language Features

Core TypeScript

Standard Library

Native npm Package Implementations

Compiling npm Packages Natively

Compiler Optimizations

Plugin System

Testing (Geisterhand)

Ecosystem

perry-react

perry-sqlite / perry-postgres / perry-prisma

Commands

Compiler flags

Project Structure

Runtime Characteristics

Development

Adding a new feature

License

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