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All about Apple Silicon

Table of Contents

  1. Apple Silicon
  2. 1. Devices running M-series processors
  3. 2. M5: introducing fusion architecture
  4. 3. M4: Apple Intelligence at its core
  5. 4. M3: More than a third-generation spec bump
  6. 5. M2: The second generation of Apple Silicon
  7. 6. M1: The Mac's first custom processor
  8. 7. A-series processors
  9. 8. A19 & A19 Pro
  10. 9. A18 & A18 Pro
  11. 10. A17 Pro
  12. 11. A16 Bionic
  13. A15 Bionic
  14. A14 Bionic
  15. A13 Bionic
  16. A12X Bionic and A12Z Bionic
  17. A12 Bionic
  18. A11 Bionic
  19. 12. C-series modems
  20. 13. Transition
  21. Universal 2
  22. Rosetta 2
  23. Virtualization

Apple Silicon doesn't refer to a specific chipset or processor but to the company's custom silicon as a whole. Its development lets the company focus on performance and vertical integration across platforms rather than needing to optimize software to work with another company's hardware.

The custom processors developed by Apple have benefitted iPhone and iPad for years. The Mac began using them in 2020.

Following more than a decade of chip architecture experience gleaned from developing the A-series processors, Apple prepared the way for Apple Silicon on Mac with macOS Big Sur, Mac Catalyst, and several other developer platforms.

It took the next step for more vertical integration with the C1 modem in iPhone 16e and the N1 networking chip in iPhone 17. Ultimately, Apple is expected to ditch Qualcomm chips in favor of its in-house solutions.

Apple made its first custom processors out of necessity because Intel did not want to design chips for the iPhone. So, Apple built custom processors for the iPhone, ensuring complete vertical integration with the software.

The A-series chips went on to become the most powerful and efficient mobile chipsets available at the time, and Qualcomm and even Intel could not keep up. Now the Mac has M-series chips pushing beyond what was possible when running Intel on the Mac.

Devices running M-series processors

Every Mac uses the M-series processor while multiple iPads use it minus the iPad mini and entry model. The Apple Vision Pro also uses an M-series chip.

Current Macs:

Current iPads:

M5: introducing fusion architecture

The M5 family of chips are built with two 3-nanometer chips connected via a fusion interconnect designed by Apple. The fusion architecture enables Apple to expand the capabilities of Apple Silicon beyond the limitations introduced when using a single die.

M5 is used in the following:

  • iPad Pro (2025)
  • Apple Vision Pro (2025)
  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2025)
  • MacBook Air (2026)

M5 Pro and M5 Max were introduced in March 2026 in the MacBook Pro lineup. The remaining Macs waiting for the M5 processor may have a long wait due to memory and chip shortages.

M4: Apple Intelligence at its core

The M4 processor is built on the 3-nanometer process with a 10-core CPU and a 10-core GPU. The Neural Engine got an upgrade with a focus on Apple Intelligence.

M4 was used in the following:

  • iPad Pro (2024)
  • iMac (2024)
  • Mac mini (2024)
  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2024)
  • 13-inch MacBook Air (2025)
  • 15-inch MacBook Air (2025)

M4 Pro was used in the following:

  • Mac mini (2024)
  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2024)
  • 16-inch MacBook Pro (2024)

M4 Max was used in the following:

  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2024)
  • 16-inch MacBook Pro (2024)
  • Mac Studio (2025)

M3: More than a third-generation spec bump

When Apple transitioned to Apple Silicon, it did so when the world's supply chain was upended by global instability and a pandemic. Product launches seemed to stretch out on a longer pattern than what Apple wanted, but it seems with M3 the cycle has achieved regularity.

The M3, M3 Pro, and M3 Max were all revealed by Apple simultaneously during the "Scary Fast" event in October 2023.

M3 was used in the following:

  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2023)
  • 13-inch MacBook Air (2024)
  • 15-inch MacBook Air (2024)
  • iMac (2023)
  • iPad Air (2025)

M3 Pro was used in the following:

  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2023)
  • 16-inch MacBook Pro (2023)

M3 Max was used in the following:

  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2023)
  • 16-inch MacBook Pro (2023)

M3 Ultra was used in the following:

  • Mac Studio (2025)

The M3 family of processors are built with the 3-nanometer process. They have features like Dynamic Caching, hardware-accelerated ray tracing and mesh shading, and faster processing cores.

M2: The second generation of Apple Silicon

The M2 is around 18% faster than the M1 it replaces, has 25% more transistors, and can be configured with up to 10 GPU cores. It has the Media Engine, which wasn't introduced in the first generation until the M1 Pro.

M2 was used in the following:

  • 13-inch MacBook Air (2022)
  • 15-inch MacBook Air (2023)
  • 13-inch MacBook Pro (2022)
  • iPad Pro (2022)
  • Mac mini (2023)
  • Apple Vision Pro (2024)
  • iPad Air (2024)

M2 Pro was used in the following:

  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2023)
  • 16-inch MacBook Pro (2023)
  • Mac Mini (2023)

M2 Max was used in the following:

  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2023)
  • 16-inch MacBook Pro (2023)
  • Mac Studio (2023)

M2 Ultra was used in the following:

  • Mac Studio (2023)
  • Mac Pro (2023)

M1: The Mac's first custom processor

While Apple has already spent well over a decade making powerful chipsets for the iPhone and iPad, the company isn't using those in the new Macs. Instead, there is a specific system-on-a-chip architecture used for Macs and MacBooks called the M1.

The M1 uses a 5nm architecture with 16 billion transistors, four high-performance cores, four high-efficiency cores, and eight GPU cores. Even in the MacBook Air, which lacks external cooling and has one of the GPU cores disabled, the machine still runs faster than 98% of consumer notebooks on the market.

M1 was used in the following:

  • MacBook Air (2020)
  • Mac mini (2020)
  • 13-inch MacBook Pro (2020)
  • iMac (2021)
  • iPad Pro (2021)
  • iPad Air (2022)

Apple boasted the M1 as the world's fastest CPU in low-power silicon, the world's best CPU performance per watt, the world's fastest graphics in a personal computer, and breakthrough machine learning (ML) thanks to the Neural Engine. This adds up to the M1 having a 3.5x faster CPU, 6x faster GPU, and 15x faster ML than previous Macs using Intel.

The GPU is capable of running nearly 25,000 threads simultaneously with 2.6 teraflops of throughput. Apple says this makes it the fastest integrated GPU in a consumer PC.

The M1 Pro has up to a 10-core CPU, up to a 16-core GPU, and can be configured with 32GB of RAM.

M1 Pro was used in the following:

  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2021)
  • 16-inch MacBook Pro (2021)

The M1 Max has up to a 10-core CPU, up to a 32-core GPU, and can be configured with 64GB of RAM.

M1 Max was used in the following:

  • 14-inch MacBook Pro (2021)
  • 16-inch MacBook Pro (2021)
  • Mac Studio (2022)

The M1 Ultra has a 20-core CPU and can be configured with up to a 64-core GPU and 128GB of RAM. It is the first desktop-only Apple Silicon processor, and it was built by essentially combining two M1 Max processors with an UltraFusion connector.

M1 Ultra was used in the following:

  • Mac Studio (2022)

A-series processors

During the 2020 WWDC, Apple boasted about successfully bringing 10 billion chips to devices through the years and wanting to bring that expertise to Mac. The company believed that it could hit the sweet spot between power consumption and performance by offering chips that are very powerful while remaining very efficient.

A chipset graphic with the words 'A19 Pro' on it next to an Apple logo The A19 Pro is used in the latest iPhones

Over a decade of custom chip building through 2020, Apple has been able to increase CPU performance by 100x and GPU performance by 1000x.

Apple also designed new system architectures and technologies to specifically take advantage of its design, like the Neural Engine for machine learning or the Secure Enclave for encryption. Combine those technologies with the existing software implementations like Metal and Swift, and Apple can utilize its custom chipsets far better than with Intel.

A19 & A19 Pro

Both A19 and A19 Pro use a 6-core CPU with two performance cores and two efficiency cores, though A19 Pro has improvements in the performance cores that help improve its bandwidth. Apple's focus in this generation was on AI performance.

A19 has only been used in the iPhone 17 so far.

A19 Pro was used in the following:

A18 & A18 Pro

There are two chipsets in this generation for the first time, which marks the end of a long transition to begin distinguishing between base model and pro chipsets. The A18 is said to be 30% faster than the A16 it replaces and gains leaps in GPU performance thanks to hardware accelerated ray tracing and mesh mapping.

A18 was used in the following:

The A18 Prowas said to be 15% faster than the A17 Pro and has an additional GPU core, which makes it 20% more performant. It was also the first chip used in a Mac, the MacBook Neo, introduced in March 2026.

A18 Pro was used in the following:

  • iPhone 16 Pro
  • iPhone 16 Pro Max
  • MacBook Neo (2026)

A17 Pro

The first Apple Silicon built on the 3-nanometer process was the A17 Pro. Apple said it was 10% faster than the previous generation, while the GPU is 20% faster, and it was the first chipset with the AV1 video decoder.

A17 Pro was used in the following:

Apple did not release a non-pro variant of the A17.

A16 Bionic

The A16 Bionic comes with 2 high-performance cores and 4 high-performance corse. It has a 5-core GPU with more memory bandwidth aimed at better gaming performance.

A16 Bionic was used in the following:

A15 Bionic

The A15 has a 6-core CPU with two performance cores and four efficiency cores. The GPU has 4 cores or 5 cores depending on what device it is used in.

The Neural Engine is faster, with 15.8 trillion operations per second. The chip includes a new image signal processor for improved photos and new features.

The A15 average single-core score is 1730, a roughly 10% increase from the A14 score of 1575. Multi-core scores average out to 4621, or nearly 21% higher than the previous model.

These devices run the A15 Bionic:

A14 Bionic

The A14 packs in 11.8 billion transistors onto the chip, up from the 8.5 billion of the A13, with the changes enabling Apple to be more precise in how it uses the chip to shape the user's experience. The higher transistor count translates directly into compute power that can be used in games or apps.

The Neural Engine is 16 cores versus 8 cores in the previous generation. This enables things like better computational photography or improved learning algorithms in applications.

The A14 boasts a 6-core CPU and 4-core GPU in a 5-nanometer process. Benchmarks for the A14 Bionic in the iPhone 12 Pro score about 20% faster than the A13 in the iPhone 11 Pro.

These devices run the A14 Bionic:

A13 Bionic

The 2.66GHz, 6-core processor scores 1325 single-core and 3382 multi-core in Geekbench 5. The 13-inch MacBook Pro with an 8th-generation Intel Core i5 processor scores similar.

These devices run the A13 Bionic:

A12X Bionic and A12Z Bionic

The iPad-specific processors in the A12 series are unique in the fact that they are the same chipset. The A12Z is a re-binned A12X with the extra GPU core active. Because of this they score very similarly.

The single-core score is 1115 and multi-core is 4626 in Geekbench 5. The mid-range 16-inch MacBook Pro with an Intel Core i7 processor scores similar.

When placed within the Apple Developer Transition Kit, it scores single-core 1005 and multi-core 4555.

These devices run the A12Z Bionic:

  • 2nd-generation 11-inch iPad Pro
  • 4th-generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro
  • Apple Developer Transition Kit

A12 Bionic

The 2.5GHz processor scores 1106 single-core and 2687 multi-core in Geekbench 5. An iMac 4K with the Intel Core i5 scores similar.

These devices run the A12 Bionic:

  • iPhone XR
  • iPhone XS
  • iPhone XS Max
  • iPad Air 3
  • 5th-generation iPad mini

A11 Bionic

The first Apple Silicon with a dedicated Neural Engine, thus dubbed "Bionic," scored 917 single-core and 2350 multi-core on Geekbench 5. The 2020 MacBook Air with the Intel Core i3 scores similar.

These devices run the A11 Bionic:

  • iPhone 8
  • iPhone 8 Plus
  • iPhone X

The specs and year-over-year gains in Apple's mobile chipsets may hint at the degree to which the M1 and future Apple Silicon for Mac will improve.

C-series modems

Apple's C1 debuted in the iPhone 16e in 2025 as its first in-house modem. It lacks the mmWave 5G spectrum, but otherwise seems comparable in performance to the similar Qualcomm chips used by Apple.

A graphic representing a modem with the letters 'C1X' on the front by an Apple logo Apple's C1X modem is an in-house option that pushes for more vertical integration

The C1X was introduced with the iPhone Air and is also used in the iPad Pro with M5 and cellular. It is a power efficient modem that's also twice as fast as the C1.

Vertical integration means that Apple has more control over how the iPhone and users interact with the modem. For example, iOS 26.3 introduces the limit precise location feature, which enables users to obfuscate the location data provided to carriers.

The Apple Silicon Transition

After the initial Apple Silicon announcement, Apple provided a Developer Transition Kit that developers could order using the "Universal App Quick Start Program." The DTK was a Mac mini running on an A12Z with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage. Developers had to pay $500 to rent the machine, which they later had to return.


The Developer Transition Kit will be a Mac Mini with an A12Z The Developer Transition Kit will be a Mac Mini with an A12Z

With this kit, devs can get started making apps run natively on macOS and Apple Silicon. However, hardware is not all that Apple included to help with the process.

During WWDC 2020, developers could attend virtual sessions or discuss issues with engineers within the forums and the Apple Developer app. Apple also provided day-one documentation on developing and testing Universal apps.

Any app built for iOS or iPadOS runs natively on the Apple Silicon Mac as well.

Universal 2, Rosetta 2, and Virtualization software will make the transition smooth Universal 2, Rosetta 2, and Virtualization software will make the transition smooth

On macOS Big Sur, there are multiple applications built just for the transition. Apple called out three specific ones: Universal 2, Rosetta 2, and Virtualization.

Apple technically completed the transition away from Intel with its Mac Studio release in 2022. The company hinted at a Mac Pro running an M-series processor, but it didn't arrive in 2022.

The tower Mac Pro with Intel is still for sale, and the future of the product isn't yet known. Apple could still introduce an M2-variant of the product in 2023.

Universal 2

Universal 2 is a universal binary that works on Intel and Apple Silicon-based Macs. With the same binary developers can make apps that work on both platforms.

Third-party developers like Microsoft and Adobe have already begun building apps to work on the new chipset. The WWDC demo showed the new apps running easily even while editing 4K video live.

Rosetta 2

As Rosetta allowed PowerPC apps to run on Intel Macs, Rosetta 2 is fulfilling the same role to allow Intel apps to run on the new architecture.

Instead of a "just in time" (JIT) process that the original Rosetta used, Rosetta 2 does the heavy lifting on installation with the translation of the code, front-loading the processing load. Code in third-party browsers executing Java and similar other technologies are still using JIT technologies for execution.

As demonstrated at WWDC, Rosetta 2 is powerful enough to run some games built for Intel without significant issues. 

Virtualization

Virtualization software also runs on Apple Silicon Macs, but the extent of what and how is not fully known yet. Apple has demonstrated Linux use through virtualization apps like Parallels desktop, and Parallels offers an M1-friendly variant of its software that can run ARM-based Windows.

M1 Macs don't support BootCamp for running Windows. Apple's Craig Federighi has said that it's up to you Microsoft whether to support M1 Macs with its desktop OS.

Apple mentioned that other platforms like Docker will also work on Apple Silicon and that devs will be able to take full advantage of the software.