What performance increase is typically expected from multithreading?

Multithreading allows a program to execute multiple threads simultaneously, which can significantly enhance performance by better utilizing the processing capabilities of modern CPUs, particularly those with multiple cores. Typically, when applications are designed to take advantage of multithreading, they can achieve a performance increase in the range of 15-30%. This range accounts for the overhead and complexities associated with managing multiple threads, including issues such as synchronization and context switching. Although some applications might experience higher performance gains, the expected and more common improvement across a variety of multithreaded applications tends to align with this figure.

While higher performance increases, such as over 50%, can certainly happen in some cases—especially in well-optimized programs or those handling very large data sets or heavy computational tasks—achieving such gains is not the standard expectation. Therefore, 15-30% reflects a more realistic performance increase for the average application leveraging multithreading effectively.