First Geekbench Scores for New Mac Mini With M2 Pro Surface, Beats M1 Max

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Geekbench scores for the newly announced Mac mini with M2 and M2 Pro chips have revealed a significant increase in performance compared to the previous-generation Mac mini and previous M1 Pro and M1 Max devices.

m2 mac mini screen feature
The scores reveal that the Mac mini with M2 Pro achieved a single-core score of 1,952 and a multi-core score of 15,013 for a configuration with 16GB of unified memory. For comparison, the previous M1 Mac mini achieved a single-core score of 1,715 and a multi-core score of 7,442.

The Geekbench scores are the first we've seen for the new M2 Pro, which is also available on updated 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros. While we've yet to see Geekbench scores for the updated MacBook Pros, M2 Pro's performance with the Mac mini is unlikely to differ greatly from its performance with the new Mac notebooks.

m2 pro geekbench
The M1 Pro in the previous-generation 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro scored a single-core score of 1,734 and a multi-core score of 10,076 compared to a single-core of 1,952 and a multi-core score of 15,013 for the M2 Pro. The M2 Pro, according to these results, also beats the M1 Max, which achieves 1,727 single-core and 12,643 multi-core scores.

Geekbench scores for the Mac mini with the M2 chip have also surfaced, revealing similar performance to the M2 MacBook Air announced in June 2022.

Users can configure the Mac mini with M2 with up to 24GB of unified memory, compared to 16GB with the previous M1 model. With the M2 Pro, Mac mini models can be configured with 32GB of unified memory. 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pros powered with the high-end variant of M2 Max can have up to 96GB of RAM.

Both the updated Mac mini and 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro are available for pre-order on Apple's website and will begin arriving to customers on Tuesday, January 24.

Related Roundup: Mac mini
Buyer's Guide: Mac Mini (Neutral)
Related Forum: Mac mini

Top Rated Comments

nikusak Avatar
nikusak
10 months ago

Better than expected but still behind Intel 13th gen. Apple needs to bring their A Game for M3 chips.
How is the battery life, fan noise and heat on those 13th gen Intel laptops?

And what about the performance when unplugged?
Score: 52 Votes (Like | Disagree)
chucker23n1 Avatar
chucker23n1
10 months ago

Better than expected but still behind Intel 13th gen. Apple needs to bring their A Game for M3 chips.
The thermals are likely somewhere between Raptor Lake-P and Raptor Lake-U. The top Raptor Lake-P part scores roughly the same as the M1 Pro. ('https://browser.geekbench.com/search?q=1370p') The top Raptor Lake-H part performs very similarly to the M2 Pro ('https://browser.geekbench.com/search?utf8=✓&q=13900hk'), but burns more energy.

Now, Raptor Lake-HX does handily beat the M2 Pro. ('https://browser.geekbench.com/search?utf8=✓&q=13980hx') But then we're talking 55-157W, which is way more.

So, in terms of performance per watt, Apple is still well ahead.
Score: 47 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Danfango Avatar
Danfango
10 months ago

Better than expected but still behind Intel 13th gen. Apple needs to bring their A Game for M3 chips.
Nah it's fine. Energy is a major cost and constraint these days, even in our office!

We don't need faster chips, we need more grunt-per-watt and that's what Apple are doing.
Score: 38 Votes (Like | Disagree)
chucker23n1 Avatar
chucker23n1
10 months ago
Comparing against the 16-inch 10-core M1 Pro: 1742, 12141

So, single-core is up 12.1% (meh), and multi-core is up 23.7%. But the clock is also up 9.4%, so at the same clock, single-core is only up 2.5% and multi-core 13.1% (in part explained because there's 8+4 cores instead of 8+2).

Not terrible for 14 months, but not fantastic either.
Score: 35 Votes (Like | Disagree)
nicolas_s Avatar
nicolas_s
10 months ago

Nah it's fine. Energy is a major cost and constraint these days, even in our office!

We don't need faster chips, we need more grunt-per-watt and that's what Apple are doing.
Exactly. Many still say that we shouldn't care about energy consumption on a desktop device, but here in Europe it's starting to become more and more of a deciding factor.
Score: 23 Votes (Like | Disagree)
andrewxgx Avatar
andrewxgx
10 months ago

Better than expected but still behind Intel 13th gen. Apple needs to bring their A Game for M3 chips.
sure
except one is quite cool and power efficient while the other is hotter than the sun
Score: 23 Votes (Like | Disagree)
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