A system and method for ranking computing resources in a distributed computing marketplace is disclosed. Ranking may be based on the performance factors that the system predicts will have the greatest impact on the particular application the user plans to run. A performance database stores historical performance data for applications that have been executed on multiple different computer systems. The database is checked to see if the application, or one similar, has already been run on any of the computing systems participating in the distributed computing marketplace. If so, the existing performance data is used to predict which performance factors will have the greatest impact on the application. Those factors are then used to rank the available computing systems options for the user.