What's better at freeing memory with PHP: unset() or $var = null

Question

I realise the second one avoids the overhead of a function call (update, is actually a language construct), but it would be interesting to know if one is be

Answer 1

Code example from comment

echo "PHP Version: " . phpversion() . PHP_EOL . PHP_EOL;

$start = microtime(true);
for ($i = 0; $i < 10000000; $i++) {
    $a = 'a';
    $a = NULL;
}
$elapsed = microtime(true) - $start;

echo "took $elapsed seconds" . PHP_EOL;



$start = microtime(true);
for ($i = 0; $i < 10000000; $i++) {
    $a = 'a';
    unset($a);
}
$elapsed = microtime(true) - $start;

echo "took $elapsed seconds" . PHP_EOL;

Running in docker container from image php:7.4-fpm and others..

PHP Version: 7.4.8
took 0.22569918632507 seconds null
took 0.11705803871155 seconds unset
took 0.20791196823121 seconds null
took 0.11697316169739 seconds unset

PHP Version: 7.3.20
took 0.22086310386658 seconds null
took 0.11882591247559 seconds unset
took 0.21383500099182 seconds null
took 0.11916995048523 seconds unset

PHP Version: 7.2.32
took 0.24728178977966 seconds null
took 0.12719893455505 seconds unset
took 0.23839902877808 seconds null
took 0.12744522094727 seconds unset

PHP Version: 7.1.33
took 0.51380109786987 seconds null
took 0.50135898590088 seconds unset
took 0.50358104705811 seconds null
took 0.50115609169006 seconds unset

PHP Version: 7.0.33
took 0.50918698310852 seconds null
took 0.50490307807922 seconds unset
took 0.50227618217468 seconds null
took 0.50514912605286 seconds unset

PHP Version: 5.6.40
took 1.0063569545746 seconds null
took 1.6303179264069 seconds unset
took 1.0689589977264 seconds null
took 1.6382601261139 seconds unset

PHP Version: 5.4.45
took 1.0791940689087 seconds null
took 1.6308979988098 seconds unset
took 1.0029168128967 seconds null
took 1.6320278644562 seconds unset

But, with other example:

Results:

PHP Version: 7.4.8
took 0.053696155548096 seconds
took 0.053897857666016 seconds

PHP Version: 7.3.20
took 0.054572820663452 seconds
took 0.054342031478882 seconds

PHP Version: 7.2.32
took 0.05678391456604 seconds
took 0.057311058044434 seconds


PHP Version: 7.1.33
took 0.097366094589233 seconds
took 0.073100090026855 seconds

PHP Version: 7.0.33
took 0.076443910598755 seconds
took 0.077098846435547 seconds

PHP Version: 7.0.33
took 0.075634002685547 seconds
took 0.075317859649658 seconds

PHP Version: 5.6.40
took 0.29681086540222 seconds
took 0.28199100494385 seconds

PHP Version: 5.4.45
took 0.30513095855713 seconds
took 0.29265689849854 seconds