Brainfuck
Shares rank 110 of 163 programming languages by recommenders
Minimal esoteric language people use to teach low-level logic and for fun. Critics say it is impractical for writing large programs or software for others.
Minimal esoteric language people use to teach low-level logic and for fun. Critics say it is impractical for writing large programs or software for others.
10 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 8
- criticize it
- 2
- approval share
- 80%
Recommended in 3 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: not recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: not recommended
- April 2026: not recommended
- May 2026: not recommended
- June 2026: not recommended
- July 2026: not recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: not recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 8 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, not met.
- 4 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 3 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, not met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Teaches low-level logic to students
“as an educational tool, the only thing wrong with it is the name”
Comment from 4 Dec 2025 in “1D Conway's Life glider found, 3.7B cells long” “just to really show students how low-level logic can be”
Comment from 3 Dec 2025 in “1D Conway's Life glider found, 3.7B cells long” Fun, beautiful esoteric toy language
“It's a beautiful little toy language.”
Comment from 10 Dec 2025 in “Revisiting "Let's Build a Compiler"” “fun esoteric languages like Brainfuck”
Comment from 10 Aug 2026 in “Because It's Not Fun Enough: why languages fail”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Unsuitable for large or real programs
“I wouldn't want to write a big program in it”
Comment from 3 Dec 2025 in “1D Conway's Life glider found, 3.7B cells long” “It and Brainfuck are the only 2 languages you should never use to make software for other people”
Comment from 3 Nov 2025 in “Why engineers can't be rational about programming languages” Very slow to run programs
“interpreting the brainfuck mandelbrot program takes several hours”
Comment from 20 Aug 2026 in “Sectorforth is a 16-bit x86 Forth that fits in a 512-byte boot sector”
Other programming languages people recommend
The four most recommended other programming languages, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
See all 163 programming languages, rankedWhat people said
All 11 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“this work of art is worth linking (no irony, I love it)”
“interpreting the brainfuck mandelbrot program takes several hours”
“fun esoteric languages like Brainfuck”
“INTERCAL/Brainfuck less so...”
“The language of anti-AI resistance!”
“It's a beautiful little toy language.”
“as an educational tool, the only thing wrong with it is the name”
“just to really show students how low-level logic can be”
“I wouldn't want to write a big program in it”
“The only way to win is with Brainfuck.”
“It and Brainfuck are the only 2 languages you should never use to make software for other people”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.