Node uses a JIT compiler (V8) and is not interpreted. This is why it's so fast. You could compare it with PyPy, a just-in-time compiler for python. For exampl

Node uses a JIT compiler (V8) and is not interpreted. This is why it's so fast. You could compare it with PyPy, a just-in-time compiler for python. For example, on my machine, the same program runs in 2:12 min with the regular python interpreter, and in 1.57 seconds with pypy.