# What is PyPy?

In common parlance, PyPy has been used to mean two things. The first is the RPython translation toolchain, which is a framework for generating dynamic programming language implementations. And the second is one particular implementation that is so generated – an implementation of the Python programming language written in Python itself. It is designed to be flexible and easy to experiment with.

This double usage has proven to be confusing, and we are trying to move away from using the word PyPy to mean both things. From now on we will try to use PyPy to only mean the Python implementation, and say the RPython translation toolchain when we mean the framework.

Some older documents, presentations, papers and videos will still have the old usage. You are hereby warned.

We target a large variety of platforms, small and large, by providing a compiler toolsuite that can produce custom Python versions. Platform, memory and threading models, as well as the JIT compiler itself, are aspects of the translation process - as opposed to encoding low level details into the language implementation itself.

For more details, have a look at our architecture overview.