With Java vs C++, the experience seems similar. In C++, memory allocation is slow, so you worry about memory allocation up front. In Java, GC is a pain so you worry about memory allocation up front. As Daniel points out, there are a few extra tricks available to native developers (eg vector instructions), so there's a small factor speed-up in best-practice C++ vs best-practice Java, but this is closing (eg the JIT increasingly uses vector instructions). Overwhelmingly the difference between a slow system and a fast system is appropriate choices of algorithms and architecture, not the language.