A lot worse than what you had been using on the Pi 3B, or a lot worse than something more modern than a 3B ?However the performance is actually quite a lot worse, opening (for example) a browser or any sort of application (like one of the programming IDEs) takes ages.
I have been using a 3B (non-plus) until fairly recently, Buster Desktop with 64-bit kernel but 32-bit userland. I have never used 64-bit userland so can't say if that slows things down. That 3B was tolerable enough when used via the command line but always fairly slow on the desktop when launching browsers, Thonny, Arduino IDE and VS Code.
I then moved to a Pi 4B 1GB, Bookworm Desktop, again with 64-bit kernel and 32-bit userland, and that 3B felt even slower than it did.
The Pi 4B is, apart from when browsing, roughly on par with the Windows PC I am using so I am happy with it. I recently installed Raspberry Pi Desktop for PC and Mac on a 17 year old Asus Eee PC 904HD and that, unsurprisingly, also feels slow in comparison.
I imagine, if I did get a Pi 5, my PC and that 4B will feel slower than they do now, the 3B and Eee PC even more so.
But it's no different to booting up an old laptop or desktop you have lying around when the first thing you notice is it's a lot slower than you remember it at the time. Or when you buy a new PC and can't figure out how you ever got by with what it replaces for so long. I expect that when the Pi 6 arrives there will be some wondering how they got by with using a Pi 5.
And little different to moving from a car which has phenomenal acceleration to something which doesn't.
The simple fact is, no matter how it was hyped at the time, older hardware is slower than the latest. The Pi 4B is about 8 times as fast as a 3B (non-plus), a Pi 5 about 20 times faster. Going the other way; a 3B has just 5% of a Pi 5's speed, 12% of a Pi 4B's.
I would doubt you are going to make up that difference using a different OS. A larger and faster SD Card may however deliver noticeable improvements. But you will still be constrained by the 3B's limited memory when it comes to browsers.
If you want a Pi you can use as a desktop or development platform, the best fix IMO is to buy a more modern Pi or comparable PC.
But one thing I would note is I have never felt a Pi is as slow as the raw numbers indicate. The slowness is mostly noticeable when it is exposed, particularly when using desktop apps like browsers and IDE.
It's the old, if you want to go racing buy a race car, don't expect an old family saloon to be up there with the winners.
Statistics: Posted by hippy — Sat Jul 05, 2025 11:30 am