The Apple M1 MacBook Pro 13-Inch Benchmarks are in, thanks to the team at Apple Insider. They've run their own tests including Geekbench and the numbers are impressive.

Using the new Late-2020 13” MacBook Pro with Apple's M1 processor, the team ran a battery of test and compared them to many of the current Intel machine, including the new Mac Pro 2019. Particularly on single-core but even on multicore performance.

So far the verdict from several sources is low heat, almost zero cooling fan noise, and staggering speeds when launching applications.

All of the 3 new Apple Macs announced are equipped with the same 8-core M1 chip that also offers an integrated GPU, with Apple offering no CPU upgrades.

Although there are no CPU upgrade options with the new M1 powered MacBook Air, Mac mini and MacBook Pro machines, there is a small GPU upgrade available for the ‌MacBook Air‌. The base ‌MacBook Air‌ ships with an M1 chip with a 7-core GPU, which can be upgraded to an 8 core GPU. If you choose the $1,249 ‌MacBook Air‌ model with a 512GB SSD, it upgrades automatically to an 8-core GPU instead of the default 7-core GPU, but there is no custom configuration option to choose the lower tier model with the upgraded 8-core GPU option, whereas the MacBook Pro has an M1 chip with an 8-core GPU.

Both the ‌MacBook Air‌ and the MacBook Pro can be customised with more RAM (up to 16GB) and more storage space (up to 2TB). The Mac mini also has the same M1 chip with 8-core GPU as the MacBook Pro, again with no GPU/CPU upgrade option available.

What new Apple Mac M1 Can I Buy Now?

Three machines have been announced so far;

• Apple M1 MacBook Air

• Apple Mac mini with M1 Chip

• New Apple MacBook Pro with M1 Chip

MacBook Air, 13" MacBook Pro, Mac mini - Everything You Need To Know

Will My Applications Run On A New Apple Mac M1?

macOS Big Sur has been designed for the M1 and so for the first time on a Mac, Apple is able to design the operating system and the silicon together as they have been doing for iPhones and iPads for some years now. They are claiming launching apps is nearly instantaneous, while Safari really ‘shines on Apple Silicon’ as well as 1.5x speedier at running JavaScript and what they claim to be ‘1.9x more responsive’. 

There is a hardware-verified secure boot, automatic high-performance encryption, macOS run-time protections.

With Big Sur and M1, Apple say that users will be able to run a greater range of apps than ever before. All of Apple’s Mac software is now Universal and runs natively on M1 systems.

Apple has optimised all of their apps for the new M1 CPU. For pro-audio, Apple claims you will be able to run 3x more instruments and effect plugins in Logic Pro. For video editors, Final Cut Pro can run up to 6x faster.

Existing Mac apps that have not been updated to Universal will run seamlessly with Apple’s Rosetta 2 technology. Apple says that some apps perform better under Rosetta than running natively on Macs with old integrated graphics and for the first time iPhone and iPad apps can now run directly on Mac. Additionally, the foundations of Big Sur are optimised to unlock the power of M1, including developer technologies from Metal for graphics, and Core ML for machine learning.

Check if your audio software and hardware will work

Should You Buy A New Apple Mac M1?

If you are making a living using an Apple Mac in music or post-production then we don't advise moving to a new Apple Mac M1 at this time. It's going to take some time for both software and hardware manufacturers to catch up, so you may find yourself with a super-fast machine but lots of compatibility headaches.

Read more here about buying a new Apple Mac M1 for audio work

Remember the early models of the new Apple Mac M1 processor machines are aimed at the lower end of the market, but the if this is what Apple is delivering on their base machines, just imagine what their high-end machines like the Mac Pro and iMac Pro are going to be like.