Numba is a Python compiler that translates Python code into fast machine code using the LLVM compiler infrastructure. It allows Python code that works with NumPy arrays to be just-in-time compiled to native machine instructions, achieving performance comparable to C, C++ and Fortran for numeric work. Numba provides decorators like @jit that can compile functions for improved performance on NumPy array operations. It aims to make Python a compiled and optimized language for scientific computing by leveraging type information from NumPy to generate fast machine code.