# Fuzzer Benchmark Report (from bug-count CSV)

- Time budget: **4.00h**

> **Warning — trial run.** This benchmark was executed with fewer than 10 instances per fuzzer and/or a time budget shorter than 24h. Results from trial runs are meant for debugging purposes and are not valid for extracting conclusions across different fuzzers.

## Executive summary
This report is derived solely from cumulative bugs-found over time across repeated runs per fuzzer. It emphasizes robust, distribution-based metrics (median/IQR, success rates, time-to-k) and shape-based behavior (plateau time, late discovery share) instead of single-run time-to-first-bug.

## Bugs found at fixed time budgets (median [IQR])
| Fuzzer | Runs | 1h | 4h |
|---|---|---|---|
| recon-fuzzer | 2 | 9 [8,10] | 11 [10,12] |
| echidna | 2 | 8 [7,8] | 10 [9,10] |
| medusa | 2 | 5 [5,5] | 8 [7,8] |
| foundry | 2 | 5 [5,5] | 5 [5,5] |

## Overall metrics
| Fuzzer | AUC (norm) | Plateau time | Late discovery share | Final median | Final IQR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| recon-fuzzer | 0.798 | 3.30h | 0.091 | 11 | 1.00 |
| echidna | 0.692 | 2.50h | 0.053 | 10 | 1.50 |
| medusa | 0.493 | 3.00h | 0.200 | 8 | 0.50 |
| foundry | 0.378 | 0.50h | 0.000 | 5 | 0.00 |

## Milestones: time-to-k and success rates
| Fuzzer | time-to-1 (p50) | time-to-3 (p50) | time-to-5 (p50) | reach-1 rate | reach-3 rate | reach-5 rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| recon-fuzzer | 0.00h | 0.10h | 0.10h | 100.0% | 100.0% | 100.0% |
| echidna | 0.10h | 0.10h | 0.15h | 100.0% | 100.0% | 100.0% |
| medusa | 0.10h | 0.10h | 0.45h | 100.0% | 100.0% | 100.0% |
| foundry | 0.25h | 0.45h | 0.45h | 100.0% | 100.0% | 100.0% |

## Throughput metrics (if supported by log format)
Values are run-level rates aggregated per fuzzer; `n/a` indicates the parser could not recover that metric from logs.
| Fuzzer | Runs | Tx/s runs | Tx/s p50 [p25,p75] | Gas/s runs | Gas/s p50 [p25,p75] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| recon-fuzzer | 2 | 2 | 3591.64 [3578.65,3604.63] | 2 | 15303201.00 [14348779.00,16257623.00] |
| echidna | 2 | 2 | 1987.74 [1964.68,2010.81] | 2 | 10206200582.50 [5103100291.25,15309300873.75] |
| medusa | 2 | 2 | 1328.50 [1300.75,1356.25] | 2 | 162956144.00 [158154177.50,167758110.50] |

## Progress metrics from logs (fuzzer-specific proxies)
Coverage/corpus values are parsed from each fuzzer's native progress output and are useful for trend context, not strict cross-fuzzer equivalence.
| Fuzzer | Runs | Seq/s runs | Seq/s p50 [p25,p75] | Coverage runs | Coverage p50 [p25,p75] | Corpus runs | Corpus p50 [p25,p75] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| recon-fuzzer | 2 | 0 | n/a | 2 | 72344.00 [72320.50,72367.50] | 2 | 88.50 [87.25,89.75] |
| echidna | 2 | 0 | n/a | 2 | 120880.50 [112103.25,129657.75] | 2 | 257.50 [229.25,285.75] |
| medusa | 2 | 2 | 14.00 [14.00,14.00] | 2 | 5101.00 [5069.00,5133.00] | 2 | 203.50 [202.25,204.75] |

## Statistical comparison (Mann-Whitney U test)

Pairwise Mann-Whitney U tests on end-of-budget bug counts (two-sided).
Bonferroni correction applied for 6 comparison(s). Significance level: alpha = 0.05.

**Warnings:**
- One or more fuzzers have fewer than 5 runs. Statistical power may be limited.

| Fuzzer A | Fuzzer B | Median A | Median B | U statistic | p-value | p (corrected) | Significant |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| recon-fuzzer | echidna | 11 | 9.5 | 3.0 | 0.6667 | 1.0000 | no |
| recon-fuzzer | medusa | 11 | 7.5 | 4.0 | 0.3333 | 1.0000 | no |
| recon-fuzzer | foundry | 11 | 5 | 4.0 | 0.2207 | 1.0000 | no |
| echidna | medusa | 9.5 | 7.5 | 3.5 | 0.4142 | 1.0000 | no |
| echidna | foundry | 9.5 | 5 | 4.0 | 0.2207 | 1.0000 | no |
| medusa | foundry | 7.5 | 5 | 4.0 | 0.2207 | 1.0000 | no |

No pairwise comparison reached significance after Bonferroni correction.

> **Note:** The Mann-Whitney U test assesses whether one fuzzer tends to find
> more bugs than another across runs. It does not measure effect size or
> practical importance. Small sample sizes (fewer than 5 runs) reduce
> statistical power.

## Shape-based interpretation (rules of thumb)
- **Fast-start / early-plateau**: high early checkpoint median + early plateau time + low late discovery share.
- **Steady**: moderate AUC, later plateau, consistent improvements across checkpoints, moderate variance.
- **Slow-burn / late-surge**: low early checkpoints but high late discovery share and later plateau time; often higher final median.

## Limitations
- Core metrics in this section are count-based; use `broken_invariants.md` / `broken_invariants.csv` for invariant identities.
- Severity, exploitability, and root-cause uniqueness cannot be measured directly without richer per-bug metadata.
- Harness design still affects results; mitigate by keeping harness identical across fuzzers and reporting many runs.
