golangci-lint

Performance Profiling

How to Measure

1. Verbose mode (-v)

Shows active linter count and per-analyzer execution times.

go tool golangci-lint run -v

Key output lines:

• [lintersdb] Active N linters: [...] — lists all enabled linters
• analyzers took ... with top 10 stages: ... — per-analyzer breakdown (parallel; sum exceeds wall time)
• linters took ... with stages: goanalysis_metalinter: ... — actual wall time
• Execution took ... — total execution time

2. Trace output (--trace-path)

Generates a Go execution trace viewable in browser.

go tool golangci-lint run --trace-path trace.out
go tool trace trace.out

3. CPU profiling (--cpu-profile-path)

Generates a pprof CPU profile for detailed function-level analysis.

go tool golangci-lint run --cpu-profile-path cpu.prof
go tool pprof cpu.prof

Note: golangci-lint does not provide per-linter timing directly. The -v output groups all linters under goanalysis_metalinter, but the analyzers took line shows individual analyzer stages. To isolate a specific linter, use --enable-only <linter>.

Measurement Results (2026-02-27)

Environment: macOS Darwin 23.6.0, Go 1.25, golangci-lint v2 (via go tool)

Conditions: Cache cleared before each run (go tool golangci-lint cache clean)

Profile Comparison

Profile	Config	Linters	Wall Time
Base	.golangci.yml	45	~31s

Difference: Strict profile adds only modernize linter compared to base. The previously observed 65s for base was due to cold cache; with consistent cache clearing, both profiles take similar time.

Per-Analyzer Breakdown (Base Profile, Cache Cleared)

Total analyzer time: 11m12s (parallel execution, wall time ~31s)

#	Analyzer	Time	Notes
1	buildir	1m58s	SSA IR construction (prerequisite for SSA-based linters)
2	wastedassign	56s	Depends on buildir
3	goimports	56s	Import formatting check
4	gocritic	50s	Multi-checker with many sub-analyzers
5	gosec	43s	Security analysis (depends on buildir)
6	revive	15s	Extensible linter framework
7	gofumpt	12s	Strict gofmt
8	unparam	11s	Unused function parameter detection
9	unconvert	10s	Unnecessary type conversion detection
10	buildssa	9s	SSA construction (used by multiple linters)

Resource Usage

• Memory: avg 1,452 MB, max 2,398 MB (346 samples)
• Package loading: ~378ms

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