Hear that? That’s the sound of Apple’s new MacBook Pro smashing benchmarks

Apple has only just unveiled its new MacBook Pro models powered by the new M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, and the first performance benchmarks are already starting to appear. 

If the early results are anything to go by, Apple’s newest silicon could push the new MacBook Pro performance to another level, making it a shoo-in for our list of the best laptops.

An early Geekbench test for the M5 Max (spotted by 9to5Mac) shows an impressive single-core score of 4268 and a multi-core score of 29,233.

If those numbers hold up once the new MacBook Pros land in our hands, that roughly translates to a nine per cent increase in single-core performance, and just under 14 per cent in multi-core performance compared with the previous M4 Max processors.

The benchmark itself reportedly ran on a machine identified as “Mac17,7”, which lines up with the upcoming 16-inch MacBook Pro configuration.

Of course, early benchmarks should always be taken with a pinch of salt – particularly when they appear before the hardware has officially shipped. Scores can fluctuate as more tests are run, and the full performance picture usually becomes clearer once reviewers and early buyers start pushing the machines through real workloads.

Still, even these early results paint a pretty impressive picture. The M5 Max score comfortably beats typical results for the previous-generation M4 Max, which generally lands at around 3915 in Geekbench’s single-core test, and roughly 25,702 in multi-core.

In practical terms, that kind of generational jump can translate into noticeably shorter wait times for demanding work. The previous M4 Max MacBook Pro was already capable of handling intensive tasks like 4K and 8K video editing, large RAW photo exports, software compilation, and 3D rendering with ease. 

An additional performance bump on top of that could shave valuable minutes off exports, renders, and code builds – particularly for professionals juggling multiple heavy apps at once.

GPU performance also looks strong. In the same test, the M5 Max recorded a Metal score of 232,718, placing it near the very top of Geekbench’s graphics rankings for Macs.

That result sits just behind the much larger M3 Ultra chip found in the Mac Studio, which pairs a 32-core CPU with an 80-core GPU.

Considering the MacBook Pro is a portable machine rather than a desktop workstation, that’s a pretty remarkable showing.

Naturally, we’ll have to wait for full reviews and broader testing to see exactly how the new MacBook Pro performs in real-world workloads. But if these early benchmarks are anything to go by, Apple’s latest pro laptop could once again find itself sitting comfortably at the top of the performance charts.

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