Benchmarks of the newly launched Apple M4 Max have started to appear Geekbench. So it’s no surprise that Apple retained its performance crown and took the Geekbench reigns as the fastest chip. Even multi-core performance puts recent Intel and AMD products to shame, and at a fraction of the power.
On the test bench is the fresh 16-inch MacBook Pro, which features the M4 Max in all its glory. Apple’s latest and updated design allows the M4 Max to pass benchmark tests with flying colors – scoring 4,060 points in the single-core test and 26,675 points in the multi-core test. The M3 Max results are taken from the Geekbench 6 database, while the rest of the results come from our processor reviews.
The M4 Max secured the single-core crown in Geekbench 6. The chip was approximately 30% faster than last year’s M3 Max in single-core performance and 27% in multi-core performance.
In the x86 end, AMD and Intel contrast palely. The M4 Max easily handles even multi-core mode at a fraction of the power – beating the Intel Core Ultra 9 285K by approximately 19% in the single-core category and 16% in the multi-core category. Compared to the Ryzen 9 9950X, the M4 Max showed 18% higher performance in single-core mode and 25% higher performance in multi-core mode.
| Editor | Single core result | Multi-core result |
| M4 Max | 4060 | 26675 |
| Ryzen 9 9950X | 3434 | 21,399 |
| Ultra9 core 285k | 3422 | 22954 |
| M3 Max (16 CPU cores) | 3.128 | 20928 |
The M4 Max is Apple’s flagship SoC aimed at data scientists, 3D artists and professionals. The top configuration includes 16 CPU cores (twelve high-performance and four performance) and 40 GPU cores, along with up to 128 GB of unified memory – available for both the CPU and GPU. Apple has also equipped its fresh MacBook Pro line with Thunderbolt 5 support, providing speeds of up to 120 Gbps.
The fresh Apple M4 line is a solid answer to the latest wave of AI-powered PCs from Intel, AMD and Qualcomm. While performance prospects are excellent, pricing remains an issue as Apple has always charged for its products. The full-fledged M4 Max configuration in question costs $3,999. Content creators and productivity-oriented users may be interested in laptops with dedicated graphics solutions in this price range.
Geekbench is not the best benchmark for comparing chips. So it’ll be fascinating to see how the M4 Max performs in something like Cinebench or HandBrake to see if Apple’s latest chip still beats the competition. Shipments of the 2024 MacBook Pro with the M4 Max processor will begin on November 8, so we’ll soon see what the M4 Max can do.
