We analyse and compare the complexity of several algorithms for computing modular polynomials. We show that an algorithm relying on floating point evaluation of modular functions and on interpolation, which has received little attention in the literature, has a complexity that is essentially (up to logarithmic factors) linear in the size of the computed polynomials. In particular, it obtains the classical modular polynomials $Phi_ell$ of prime level $ell$ in time O (ell^3 log^4 ell log log ell). Besides treating modular polynomials for $Gamma^0 (ell)$, which are an important ingredient in many algorithms dealing with isogenies of elliptic curves, the algorithm is easily adapted to more general situations. Composite levels are handled just as easily as prime levels, as well as polynomials between a modular function and its transform of prime level, such as the Schlafli polynomials and their generalisations. Our distributed implementation of the algorithm confirms the theoretical analysis by computing modular equations of record level around 10000 in less than two weeks on ten processors.
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