ferraus bench

Measure real-time factors of every effect on this machine

Synopsis

ferraus bench [options]

Runs each single-input effect with its defaults on a synthetic stereo signal and reports how many times faster than real time it ran. With --baseline, fails (exit 9) when any effect is more than --tolerance slower than the saved numbers.

Examples

Measure three effects

ferraus bench --only compress,reverb,limit

Detect performance regressions

ferraus bench --save bench.json && ferraus bench --baseline bench.json

Measure every effect on a 30-second signal; results as JSON

ferraus bench --duration 30s --json

Fail only when an effect is more than 25% slower than the baseline

ferraus bench --baseline bench.json --tolerance 25%

Options

Flag	Type	Default	Meaning
`--only`	list	—	Comma list of effects to measure (default: every fx-capable effect)
`--duration`	time	`10s`	Length of the synthetic test signal
`--save`	path	—	Write the results as a baseline JSON file
`--baseline`	path	—	Compare against a baseline JSON file
`--tolerance`	percent	`15%`	Allowed slowdown versus the baseline before failing

Global options

Every command also accepts the global options (-o, --json, --dry-run, --overwrite, --progress, ...). See Global options.

Exit codes

Code	Meaning
0	Success
1	Processing failed
2	Usage or parameter error
3	Input missing or unreadable
8	Cancelled
70	Internal error (bug)

Common mistakes

Beat-based times (4b, 1/4) need a tempo: pass --bpm or write 4b@120.
Percentages accept 80% or the fraction 0.8; a bare 80 means 80x, not 80%.

For models

MCP tool: ferraus_bench
Schema: ferraus schema bench
Pipeline: { op: bench, args: { ... } } (flag names with _ instead of -)
fx stage: no

{"command": "bench", "defaults": {"duration": "10s", "tolerance": "15%"}}