Apple’s new M4 Max is the fastest CPU on the market, and we haven’t even seen M4 Ultra

Apple unveiled its new MacBook Pro models this week, with M4, M4 Pro, and M4 Max chipsets. The new M4 Pro chip in the Mac mini already showed some very promising results, making it the fastest Mac ever. However, M4 Max takes it to an all new level, and performs among the highest end PC chips on the market.

To preface, all of these comparisons are based on Geekbench 6. There could be varying workflows where M4 Max may not be the best, but Geekbench is as an easy comparison point until the new Macs are actually in peoples hands, serving as a rough estimate.

M4 Max vs previous Apple Silicon

When Apple released the new MacBook Pros, they stated that it would be around 20% faster than M3 Max, and that it would be the fastest laptop chip on the market. However, the first Geekbench results are showing a more promising picture.

One of the first Geekbench results for M4 Max showcases a single-core score of 4060, and multi-core of 26675. For comparison, M3 Max scored a multi-core result of 21097, meaning that M4 Max is roughly 26% faster, at least in Geekbench.

It also beats the M2 Ultra by around 24%, which scored a multi-core result of 21471.

M4 Max vs PC chips

We can also compare the new M4 Max to some of the top PC chips on the market, the AMD Ryzen 9 9950X, as well as the Intel Core i9-14900K – the top offerings from both AMD and Intel.

While scrolling Geekbench, the best benchmark for the 9950X appears to be this one, where the chip scores a single-core result of 3630 and a multi-core score of 26653, just slightly under the multi-core score of the M4 Max. Single core also comes way ahead.

On the Intel side of things, the highest score found for the Core i9-14900K seems to be this one, with a single-core score of 3144, and multi-core of 23044. M4 Max is roughly 15% faster than Intel’s best desktop offering, and this is just a laptop chip.

We’re also yet to see Apple’s M4 Ultra chip, which should roughly double up on the M4 Max, since Apple stitches two Max dies together with its UltraFusion technology. This provides nearly double the performance with minimal performance losses.

We should see M4 Ultra for the first time mid-next year, in the Mac Studio and Mac Pro.

Are you excited for the future of Apple Silicon? Let us know in the comments.

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