Analysis of an instruction set as large and varied as the one specified for the VAX-11 architecture is important for aiding processor design evaluation. This paper looks at dynamic VAX-11 instruction set usage by one class of programs, and discusses the methodology and tools which have been developed to provide that information. Six VAX/VMS native mode compilers from Digital Equipment Corporation were used: BASIC, BLISS, COBOL, FORTRAN, PASCAL, and PL/I. A summary of results generated by analyzing executions of these six compilers is presented. Information is included for instruction and class frequency, general instruction features, operand specifiers, the memory data stream, register utilization, instruction sequencing, and branch displacements.