Last week, Apple unleashed a whole new lineup of Macs featuring the all-new M4 family of processors. Technically, the base M4 was available near the start of 2024 in the iPad Pro, but this new lineup is the first time we see this chip in an actual PC, which means it's also the first time we can test it in a fair comparison against other PCs.
Ir's been a hectic year with lots of new chips from all different companies, so you're probably wondering how the Apple M4 stacks up against the competition. To answer that question, we've stacked up the Apple M4 inside the new Mac Mini against the Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite and the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V, two of the absolute best laptop chips available right now.
What we're testing
To get some housekeeping out of the way before we dive in, we're testing the standard Apple M4 chip that comes inside the base Mac Mini model. This is a fully capable version of this chip with 10 CPU cores (four performance cores and six efficiency cores), not the 9-core version that ships inside the iPad Pro. It also has a 10-core GPU.
Representing the Snapdragon X Elite we have the Surface Laptop 7, which is one of the top-performing Snapdragon X Elite laptops, featuring the X1E-80-100 variant of the chip. There is a more powerful version, the X1E-84-100, but it's exclusive to the 16-inch Samsung Galaxy Book 4 Edge, so we weren't able to test it. We also currently don't have access to the lower tier X1E-78-100 model some laptops use, but we'll update this article if we get the opportunity to test it.
As for the Intel Core Ultra Series 2 models (Lunar Lake), we're looking at the Asus Zenbook S 14, with an Intel Core Ultra 7 258V, which is the range-topper from Intel's lineup.
Geekbench 6
A basic CPU test
Let's start with Geekbench 6, which is the basic test you'd run on any CPU. Right away, you can see Apple's unquestionable dominance in terms of single-core performance.
It's baffling just how far ahead Apple pulls here, besting both competitors by over 1,000 points in the single-core test, around 39% higher.
That performance lead decreases significantly in multi-core performance, particularly when compared to the Snapdragon X Elite, with only a 4.7% lead in terms of performance. This is because the Snapdragon X Elite only has high performance cores, and 12 of them at that. The Apple M4 only has four performance cores and six efficiency cores, which aren't as fast. Still, it manages to pull ahead, and both models beat Intel's offering by a wide margin.
Cinebench 2024
A more demanding CPU test
Cinebench is another common CPU benchmark, but a much more demanding one. It runs for a lot longer and it uses demanding workload to really stress the CPU. Once again, Apple's single-core performance is unbeatable here.
With a score of 178, the Apple M4's single-core performance beats its closest competitor, the Snapdragon X Elite, by over 43%, with an even bigger advantage over the Intel Core Ultra 7 258V.
Things take a slight turn in multi-core performance, though, where the Snapdragon X Elite actually comes out on top thanks to the 12 high-performance cores. It's a neck-and-neck matchup, though, with the Snapdrtagon X Elite pulling a 972 score against the 968 score on the Apple M4. Again, Intel falls far behind with a score of just 501 in multi-core performance.
CrossMark
Snapdragon falls behind
CrossMark is a general-purpose benchmark that tests performance for a wide range of day-to-day tasks. This is an interesting one because on Windows, CrossMark dooesn't run natively on Arm, so you can see how that affects the Snapdragon X Elite.
Apple once again takes the lead here with a 2,071 score that comfortably beats both competitors. You can see how emulation tanks the performance on the Snapdragon X Elite, which falls to third place here with a score of 1,558, far behind both Intel and Apple.
This is important because it depicts how real-life performance may be affected on Snapdragon PCs if apps aren't optimized, so even though the raw performance is great, Snapdragon PCs will sometimes provide a worse experience. Apple has much less of a problem with that because most of the ecosystem has shifted to Apple Silicon already.
3DMark
Apple's GPUs are no joke
Finally, we come to the GPU tests, and sure enough, Apple pulls a big victory here as well. We tried both Wild Life Extreme and Steel Nomad Light tests, and Apple came out on top easily.
Here, we once again see Apple taking the lead with Intel in second place, though the difference is very significant. In Wild Life Extreme, Apple scores 35% higher than Intel, while Steel Nomad Light sees Apple winning by about 25.5%.
The GPU appears to be where Snapdragon struggles the most, falling significantly behind in both tests, particularly Steel Nomad Light.
Conclusions
In terms of raw performance, it's easy to see that Apple is still the leader across the board. Qualcomm may come close in raw multi-core performance, but Apple still dominates in the GPU department, plus it has far fewer struggles with app compatibility. Still, Qualcomm is bringing some heat to this competition, and Apple has to stay on its toes now to stay ahead. It will be interesting to see how Qualcomm responds in the next year or so when its next PC chips eventually come out.
As for Intel, Apple doesn't seem to have much to worry about. Lunar Lake was a big jump forward, but Apple still has a comfortable lead across the board. It's hard to imagine this changing any time soon.