Performance Benchmark (MySqlBackup.NET v2.6, MySqlDump, MySQL.EXE)

Benchmark – MySqlBackup.NET v2.6, mysqldump.exe v8.4.5, mysql.exe v8.4.5 (Report Date: July 4th, 2025)

This benchmark is run using this version of source code.

Data Source: Github – MySqlBackup.NET Wiki (July 4th, 2025)

Read more: Understanding the Parallel Export Mechanism in MySqlBackup.NET

The parallel processing mode consistently outperforms the single-threaded mode, with time savings becoming more pronounced as database size increases. For instance, with a 2.773 GB database, parallel processing reduced export time by approximately 35~40% compared to the single-threaded approach.

One interesting side observation is that the Samsung Evo 870 SSD demonstrated nearly identical performance to the RAM disk test, which indirectly confirms that this SSD operates with near-RAM efficiency. This suggests either that the SSD achieves DDR3 RAM-level performance, or that the RAM disk implementation cannot deliver 100% of the theoretical RAM speed due to driver limitations. Another theory is that the disk I/O write operations are actually faster than SQL data generation, which means .NET object conversion becomes the bottleneck.

Comparison with Native Tools (mysqldump.exe)

The parallel implementation significantly narrows the performance gap between MySqlBackup.NET and native MySQL tools like mysqldump.exe, while preserving the flexibility and integration advantages of a .NET library. While MySqlBackup.NET’s parallel processing remains slower than mysqldump.exe, this difference is likely attributed to the additional overhead of converting MySQL raw bytes to .NET objects before generating SQL strings.

Future Performance Optimization Potential: A promising avenue for further performance enhancement would involve bypassing the intermediate .NET object conversion stage entirely. By directly referencing MySQL column metadata for data type information, the library could potentially manipulate raw bytes directly into SQL strings, eliminating the costly conversion step. This optimization could significantly reduce CPU cycles and potentially achieve another performance milestone, bringing MySqlBackup.NET’s speed even closer to native MySQL tools while maintaining its .NET ecosystem benefits.

Note: Start from v2.6, MySqlBackup.NET is running in parallel mode by default.

using (var conn = new MySqlConnection(constr))
using (var cmd = conn.CreateCommand())
using (var mb = new MySqlBackup(cmd))
{
    conn.Open();

    // enabled by default in 2.6, turn off this to run in legacy single thread
    mb.ExportInfo.EnableParallelProcessing = true;
    mb.ExportToFile(@"C:\backup.sql");
}

using (var conn = new MySqlConnection(constr))
using (var cmd = conn.CreateCommand())
using (var mb = new MySqlBackup(cmd))
{
    conn.Open();

    // enabled by default in 2.6, turn off this to run in legacy single thread
    mb.ExportInfo.EnableParallelProcessing = true;
    mb.ExportToFile(@"C:\backup.sql");
}

Disk I/O Activity Observation

The following test carried out on the following parameters:

Intel Core i7-4770S (3.10GHz) 4 core 8 thread
16GB RAM DDR3 1600 MHz
SSD Samsung 870 Evo 500GB
Windows 10 Pro x64
InnoDB: 3 tables
Database Size: 312 MB
Total Rows: 300000
MySqlDump: 8.0.34 (Export)
MySql: 8.0.34 (Import)
All processes run through Windows IIS ASP.NET WebForms, .NET Framework 4.8, App Built in Release Profile

Disk	Description
	Backup/Export – MySqlBackup.NET – Single Thread The initial disk I/O activity reaches 100% around 10 seconds at startup and then falls to 15%. This is the slowest method, but surprisingly it shows quite busy disk activity. It’s unclear what intensive disk operations are occurring during this process.
	Backup/Export – MySqlBackup.NET – Parallel Processing The initial disk I/O activity reaches 100% around 5 seconds at startup and then falls to 30%. This shows a shorter duration of disk activity spikes compared to single-threaded processing.
	Backup/Export – mysqldump.exe mysqldump does not experience an initial spike. It fluctuates between 20% – 40% disk I/O operations throughout the process. This is the fastest method with the lowest resource utilization, which is surprising.
	Restore/Import – MySqlBackup.NET Maintains steady progress at 50% disk I/O throughout the entire process.
	Restore/Import – mysql.exe Maintains steady progress at 50% disk I/O throughout the entire process.

Feature image credit: Photo by Pietro Mattia on Unsplash