# Fuzzer Benchmark Report (from bug-count CSV)

- Time budget: **24.00h**

> **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 | 8h | 24h |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| medusa | 4 | 6 [5,7] | 7 [6,7] | 8 [6,8] | 10 [9,10] |
| recon-fuzzer | 4 | 6 [6,6] | 6 [6,6] | 6 [6,7] | 6 [6,7] |
| echidna | 4 | 4 [4,4] | 4 [4,5] | 4 [4,6] | 6 [6,6] |

## Overall metrics
| Fuzzer | AUC (norm) | Plateau time | Late discovery share | Final median | Final IQR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| medusa | 0.741 | 13.70h | 0.105 | 10 | 1.25 |
| recon-fuzzer | 0.572 | 8.00h | 0.000 | 6 | 1.25 |
| echidna | 0.466 | 15.30h | 0.083 | 6 | 0.50 |

## 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| medusa | 0.10h | 0.10h | 0.10h | 100.0% | 100.0% | 100.0% |
| recon-fuzzer | 0.00h | 0.10h | 0.30h | 100.0% | 100.0% | 100.0% |
| echidna | 0.10h | 0.10h | 7.45h | 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] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| medusa | 4 | 4 | 1056.50 [1027.50,1139.75] | 4 | 642470091.50 [625021738.50,674123624.00] |
| recon-fuzzer | 4 | 4 | 9858.21 [9645.44,10090.60] | 4 | 51535534.50 [40827885.50,65211969.00] |
| echidna | 4 | 4 | 2662.31 [2615.60,2744.25] | 4 | 7898918401.50 [0.00,17531101089.75] |

## 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] |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| medusa | 4 | 4 | 10.00 [9.75,10.50] | 4 | 12459.00 [12446.50,12460.50] | 4 | 603.50 [598.75,606.50] |
| recon-fuzzer | 4 | 0 | n/a | 4 | 145390.00 [144557.25,146553.00] | 4 | 626.00 [614.00,643.25] |
| echidna | 4 | 0 | n/a | 4 | 139072.50 [138568.25,140204.25] | 4 | 566.00 [549.75,581.75] |

## Statistical comparison (Mann-Whitney U test)

Pairwise Mann-Whitney U tests on end-of-budget bug counts (two-sided).
Bonferroni correction applied for 3 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 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| medusa | recon-fuzzer | 9.5 | 6.5 | 16.0 | 0.0284 | 0.0853 | no |
| medusa | echidna | 9.5 | 6 | 16.0 | 0.0284 | 0.0853 | no |
| recon-fuzzer | echidna | 6.5 | 6 | 11.5 | 0.3529 | 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.
