Running PassMark on Raspberry Pi Zero 2 (BCM2710A1/RP3A0)
Running PassMark PerformanceTest on a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W, from finding an aarch64 build and fixing missing ncurses libraries to why the OOM killer stops a full benchmark run from ever finishing.
18.9.2026
Close-up of the RP3A0 SoC on the Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W.
TL;DR: the PassMark score is 153 but there is a reason why there is no uploaded result, for that you will need to read it in full to understand it.
Device: Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W Rev 1.0
CPU: BCM2710A1 Cortex-A53
OS: Debian 13 ARM64
PassMark PerformanceTest Linux 11.0.1004
PassMark download
to download PassMark I went to passmark download page. To find out the target architecture i have and which binary I needed to install, I ran:
$ uname -a
Linux raspberry 6.12.47+rpt-rpi-v8 #1 SMP PREEMPT Debian 1:6.12.47-1+rpt1 (2025-09-16) aarch64 GNU/LinuxWhich showed I have aarch64 and because of that I have downloaded the arm64 version via wget:
wget https://www.passmark.com/downloads/PerformanceTest_Linux_ARM64.zipThen I unzipped the file and went to the directory:
7z x PerformanceTest_Linux_ARM64.zip
cd PerformanceTest/But after running the only binary that was in the folder i got an error:
./PerformanceTest_Linux_ARM64: error while loading shared libraries: libncurses.so.5: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directoryI was missing a library. Debian 13 removed both libncurses5 and libtinfo5 from the normal repositories, so I had to install both packages from Debian 12 (Bookworm).
wget http://deb.debian.org/debian/pool/main/n/ncurses/libtinfo5_6.4-4_arm64.deb
wget http://deb.debian.org/debian/pool/main/n/ncurses/libncurses5_6.4-4_arm64.deb
sudo apt install ./libtinfo5_6.4-4_arm64.deb ./libncurses5_6.4-4_arm64.debAfter the install of the missing packages I was able to run the binary without any errors.
raspberry@raspberry:~/PerformanceTest $ ./PerformanceTest_Linux_ARM64 -help
pt_linux_arm64 [OPTIONS]
OPTIONS:
-debug enable debug logging
-p, -P num set the num of test processes (between 1 to 1024)
-d, -D enum set the test duration length, enum values are:
1 - Short
2 - Medium
3 - Long
4 - Very Long
-i, -I num set the num of test iterations (between 1 to 100)
-r, -R enum enable autorun, enum values are:
1 - CPU Suite only
2 - Memory Suite only
3 - All Suites
-h, -H, -help display help message
Before running the benchmark
Before running the benchmark I was stunned by the high memory usage of the Pi. There were a lot of services which were using a lot of memory and which shouldn’t be running.
raspberry@raspberry:~ $ ps aux --sort=-rss | head -20
USER PID %CPU %MEM VSZ RSS TTY STAT START TIME COMMAND
raspber+ 1112 0.9 3.4 774628 14652 ? Sl 17:52 0:04 /usr/bin/wf-panel-pi
root 1 0.9 1.5 25104 6500 ? Ss 17:51 0:05 /sbin/init splash
root 673 0.3 1.2 341980 5432 ? Ssl 17:51 0:02 /usr/sbin/NetworkManager --no-daemon
raspber+ 2122 233 0.8 9104 3812 pts/0 R+ 18:00 0:00 ps aux --sort=-rss
raspber+ 1918 0.1 0.8 6120 3764 pts/0 Ss 17:52 0:00 -bash
root 294 0.1 0.7 28884 3100 ? Ss 17:51 0:00 /usr/lib/systemd/systemd-journald
raspber+ 1115 1.5 0.6 582616 2768 ? Sl 17:52 0:07 pcmanfm --desktop
message+ 594 0.3 0.6 9596 2564 ? Ss 17:51 0:01 /usr/bin/dbus-daemon --system --address=systemd: --nofork --nopidfile --systemd-activation --syslog-only
root 604 0.0 0.5 18860 2416 ? Ss 17:51 0:00 /usr/lib/systemd/systemd-logind
systemd+ 340 0.0 0.5 92228 2184 ? Ssl 17:51 0:00 /usr/lib/systemd/systemd-timesyncd
polkitd 599 0.1 0.4 383076 1884 ? Ssl 17:51 0:00 /usr/lib/polkit-1/polkitd --no-debug --log-level=notice
raspber+ 1888 0.4 0.4 765392 1836 ? Ssl 17:52 0:02 /usr/bin/wireplumber
raspber+ 2123 0.0 0.4 5300 1784 pts/0 S+ 18:00 0:00 head -20
root 674 0.0 0.4 18408 1740 ? Ss 17:51 0:00 /usr/sbin/wpa_supplicant -u -s -O DIR=/run/wpa_supplicant GROUP=netdev
avahi 591 0.2 0.3 5832 1560 ? Ss 17:51 0:01 avahi-daemon: running [raspberry.local]
raspber+ 1642 0.1 0.3 413960 1448 ? Ssl 17:52 0:00 /usr/libexec/xdg-desktop-portal-gtk
root 589 0.0 0.3 310108 1392 ? Ssl 17:51 0:00 /usr/libexec/accounts-daemon
root 350 0.1 0.3 35692 1364 ? Ss 17:51 0:00 /usr/lib/systemd/systemd-udevd
raspber+ 886 0.2 0.3 140808 1324 ? Ssl 17:52 0:01 /usr/bin/labwc -mProcesses like this showed that this is not running in headless mode and that a desktop is running. I was pretty sure I didn’t set it up with a desktop but here it is…
/usr/bin/wf-panel-pi
pcmanfm --desktop
/usr/bin/labwc
xdg-desktop-portal-gtkTo be sure I ran
raspberry@raspberry:~ $ systemctl get-default
graphical.targetwhich confirmed that it’s running with a graphical env. This is how I set it to not run it again and then i have rebooted.
sudo systemctl set-default multi-user.target
Removed '/etc/systemd/system/default.target'.
Created symlink '/etc/systemd/system/default.target' → '/usr/lib/systemd/system/multi-user.target'.Both of the pictures were taken on a fresh reboot. This is the difference, from total 280Mb to only 97Mb. Yes half of the RAM was in swap but this is still a big difference, especially since the Pi has only 512MB of it.
Running the benchmark
./PerformanceTest_Linux_ARM64then I ran the binary without any arguments and pressed ‘C’ to run the CPU Tests, this is how it ended
CPU Mark: 153The CPU Mark was 153
Why are there no public PassMark results?
To be able to publish the result it requires running the full benchmark, which also includes the full RAM benchmark. It will get stuck on the Database operations.
The PerformanceTest always got stuck in the RAM phase, sooner or later the process got zombied and the main PerformanceTest process got stuck.
raspber+ 1464 7.0 0.0 0 0 pts/0 Z+ 22:26 0:07 [PerformanceTest] <defunct>
raspber+ 1465 8.8 0.0 0 0 pts/0 Z+ 22:26 0:09 [PerformanceTest] <defunct>
raspber+ 1466 7.8 0.0 0 0 pts/0 Z+ 22:26 0:08 [PerformanceTest] <defunct>
raspber+ 1467 7.8 0.0 0 0 pts/0 Z+ 22:26 0:08 [PerformanceTest] <defunct>Running dmesg showed every time that the OOM (out of memory) killer killed the process and never let the benchmark finish. Even using -p 1 -i 1 it never worked, it always got OOM.
$ sudo dmesg -w
[ 789.387613] Node 0 DMA free:114876kB boost:16384kB min:32768kB low:36864kB high:40960kB reserved_highatomic:4096KB active_anon:68524kB inactive_anon:148852kB active_file:1732kB inactive_file:27636kB unevictable:0kB writepending:0kB present:458752kB managed:426136kB mlocked:0kB bounce:0kB free_pcp:0kB local_pcp:0kB free_cma:80576kB
[ 789.387641] lowmem_reserve[]: 0 0 0 0
[ 789.387664] Node 0 DMA: 5196*4kB (UMEHC) 2697*8kB (UMEHC) 1358*16kB (UMEHC) 671*32kB (UMEHC) 215*64kB (UMEHC) 62*128kB (UMEHC) 8*256kB (UMEC) 10*512kB (UMH) 1*1024kB (H) 0*2048kB 0*4096kB = 115448kB
[ 789.387763] 7556 total pagecache pages
[ 789.387768] 0 pages in swap cache
[ 789.387773] Free swap = 421116kB
[ 789.387779] Total swap = 425980kB
[ 789.387784] 114688 pages RAM
[ 789.387789] 0 pages HighMem/MovableOnly
[ 789.387794] 8154 pages reserved
[ 789.387799] 65536 pages cma reserved
[ 789.387804] Tasks state (memory values in pages):
[ 789.387808] [ pid ] uid tgid total_vm rss rss_anon rss_file rss_shmem pgtables_bytes swapents oom_score_adj name
[ 789.387855] [ 291] 0 291 7206 1611 256 1260 95 73728 0 -250 systemd-journal
[ 789.387871] [ 338] 991 338 23057 1622 256 1366 0 77824 0 0 systemd-timesyn
[ 789.387888] [ 348] 0 348 8923 2260 768 1492 0 86016 0 -1000 systemd-udevd
[ 789.387911] [ 501] 102 501 1710 507 96 411 0 49152 0 0 rpcbind
[ 789.387927] [ 520] 0 520 1252 299 32 267 0 40960 0 0 blkmapd
[ 789.387943] [ 591] 101 591 1458 501 64 437 0 40960 0 0 avahi-daemon
[ 789.387958] [ 592] 0 592 3217 767 128 639 0 53248 0 0 bluetoothd
[ 789.387974] [ 593] 0 593 1745 555 32 523 0 40960 0 0 cron
[ 789.387989] [ 594] 990 594 2210 747 256 491 0 49152 0 -900 dbus-daemon
[ 789.388004] [ 598] 988 598 76920 937 160 777 0 86016 0 0 polkitd
[ 789.388020] [ 601] 101 601 1414 320 37 283 0 40960 0 0 avahi-daemon
[ 789.388036] [ 603] 0 603 4741 1735 288 1447 0 65536 0 0 systemd-logind
[ 789.388051] [ 659] 0 659 85492 3232 704 2528 0 167936 0 0 NetworkManager
[ 789.388066] [ 660] 0 660 4602 1425 384 1041 0 73728 0 0 wpa_supplicant
[ 789.388082] [ 688] 0 688 81103 1656 416 1240 0 131072 0 0 ModemManager
[ 789.388097] [ 809] 0 809 5567 1419 416 1003 0 73728 0 0 cupsd
[ 789.388113] [ 822] 0 822 2274 642 128 514 0 49152 0 0 login
[ 789.388128] [ 826] 0 826 2863 1206 288 918 0 57344 0 -1000 sshd
[ 789.388144] [ 831] 0 831 48821 2313 512 1801 0 131072 0 0 cups-browsed
[ 789.388160] [ 855] 1000 855 5717 2351 608 1743 0 77824 0 100 systemd
[ 789.388176] [ 858] 1000 858 5975 546 70 476 0 73728 352 100 (sd-pam)
[ 789.388191] [ 878] 1000 878 1786 564 64 500 0 40960 0 200 mpris-proxy
[ 789.388207] [ 879] 1000 879 2220 1248 544 704 0 40960 0 0 bash
[ 789.388223] [ 880] 1000 880 1994 605 64 541 0 40960 0 200 dbus-daemon
[ 789.388238] [ 895] 0 895 5385 1847 448 1399 0 81920 0 0 sshd-session
[ 789.388254] [ 903] 1000 903 5412 1245 426 819 0 81920 0 0 sshd-session
[ 789.388270] [ 904] 1000 904 2252 1279 576 703 0 45056 0 0 bash
[ 789.388290] [ 973] 1000 973 8691 2573 416 2157 0 98304 0 0 PerformanceTest
[ 789.388315] [ 997] 1000 997 52970 45517 44642 875 0 446464 64 0 PerformanceTest
[ 789.388330] oom-kill:constraint=CONSTRAINT_NONE,nodemask=(null),cpuset=/,mems_allowed=0,global_oom,task_memcg=/,task=PerformanceTest,pid=997,uid=1000
[ 789.388384] Out of memory: Killed process 997 (PerformanceTest) total-vm:211880kB, anon-rss:178568kB, file-rss:3500kB, shmem-rss:0kB, UID:1000 pgtables:436kB oom_score_adj:0I am not by far some Linux wizard so I don’t know if I am missing or doing something wrong, but taking into account also that there are no public PassMark results available, there might actually be nothing to be done about it.