Techniques are described herein for automatic generation of multi-source breadth-first search (MS-BFS) from high-level graph processing language that can be executed in a distributed computing environment. In an embodiment, a method involves a computer analyzing original software instructions. The original software instructions are configured to perform multiple breadth-first searches to determine a particular result. Each breadth-first search originates at each of a subset of vertices of a graph. Each breadth-first search is encoded for independent execution. Based on the analyzing, the computer generates transformed software instructions configured to perform a MS-BFS to determine the particular result. Each of the subset of vertices is a source of the MS-BFS. In an embodiment, the second plurality of software instructions comprises a node iteration loop and a neighbor iteration loop, and the plurality of vertices of the distributed graph comprise active vertices and neighbor vertices. The node iteration loop is configured to iterate once per each active vertex of the plurality of vertices of the distributed graph, and the node iteration loop is configured to determine the particular result. The neighbor iteration loop is configured to iterate once per each active vertex of the plurality of vertices of the distributed graph, and each iteration of the neighbor iteration loop is configured to activate one or more neighbor vertices of the plurality of vertices for the following iteration of the neighbor iteration loop.