Hash Function Comparison Reference
Side-by-side comparison of MD5, SHA-1, SHA-2, SHA-3, BLAKE2, and BLAKE3 properties.
Security Comparison
MD5 is broken with practical collision attacks in seconds. SHA-1 collisions are demonstrated (SHAttered, 2017) though preimage remains hard. SHA-2 has no practical attacks and is universally deployed. SHA-3 offers independent design insurance with equivalent security. BLAKE2/3 provide higher speed with security comparable to SHA-2/3. Only SHA-2, SHA-3, and BLAKE families are recommended for new systems.
- MD5
- Broken (collisions)
- SHA-1
- Broken (collisions)
- SHA-2/3/BLAKE
- No practical attacks
do not usedeprecatedrecommendedPerformance Comparison
BLAKE3 is the fastest on parallel hardware, achieving multiple GB/s on multi-core CPUs. BLAKE2b is fastest sequential hash on 64-bit platforms. SHA-256 with SHA-NI hardware matches BLAKE2 speed. SHA-3 is slower than SHA-2 in software but competitive with hardware. MD5 and SHA-1 are fastest but insecure. Performance should never override security in hash selection.
- BLAKE3
- Fastest parallel
- BLAKE2b
- Fastest sequential 64-bit
- SHA-256 HW
- SHA-NI accelerated
multi GB/s~1 GB/smatches BLAKE2