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Here's How Much Faster MacBook Air Gets With M5 Chip vs. M4 Chip

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We now know how much faster the new MacBook Air with the M5 chip is compared to the previous model with an M4 chip, courtesy of a Geekbench 6 result shared by TechRadar's Lance Ulanoff. However, given the 14-inch MacBook Pro and the iPad Pro were already updated with the M5 chip last year, the result is not too surprising.

MacBook-Air-15-Inch-Feature-Purple.jpg

Ulanoff ran Geekbench on a MacBook Air with an M5 chip, which has a 10-core CPU. The laptop achieved a score of 17,073 for multi-core CPU performance, whereas the MacBook Air with an M4 chip has an average multi-core score of 14,731, so the new model is up to 15% faster than the previous generation. This is in line with what Apple advertised when it announced the M5 chip back in October, so it was entirely expected.

With the M5 chip, the Geekbench database shows that the MacBook Air is up to 16% faster than the MacBook Pro with the M3 Pro chip from a few years ago, but it is still slower than MacBook Pro models with the M4 Pro chip and newer.

The table below provides a comparison of Geekbench 6 scores for various Macs. Each chip has the highest number of CPU cores available for it.

Mac ModelMulti-Core CPU Score
MacBook Pro (M5 Max)29,233
Mac Studio (M3 Ultra)27,726
MacBook Pro (M4 Max)25,702
MacBook Pro (M4 Pro)22,490
MacBook Pro (M3 Max)20,960
MacBook Air (M5)17,073
MacBook Pro (M3 Pro)15,260
MacBook Pro (M2 Max)14,740
MacBook Air (M4)14,731
MacBook Pro (M2 Pro)14,451
MacBook Pro (M1 Max)12,345
MacBook Pro (M1 Pro)12,345
MacBook Air (M3)12,020
MacBook Air (M2)9,709
MacBook Neo (A18 Pro)8,668
MacBook Air (M1)8,342


The new MacBook Air is available to pre-order now and launches on Wednesday, March 11.

For additional benchmarks, see our coverage of Geekbench results for the MacBook Pro with the M5 Max chip and the MacBook Neo with the A18 Pro chip.

Article Link: Here's How Much Faster MacBook Air Gets With M5 Chip vs. M4 Chip
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2026/03/06/macbook-air-m5-chip-benchmarks/
Last edited:
MacRumors said:


We now know how much faster the new MacBook Air with the M5 chip is compared to the previous model with an M4 chip, courtesy of a Geekbench 6 result shared by TechRadar's Lance Ulanoff. However, given the 14-inch MacBook Pro and the iPad Pro were already updated with the M5 chip last year, the result is not too surprising.

MacBook-Air-15-Inch-Feature-Purple.jpg

Ulanoff ran Geekbench on a MacBook Air with an M5 chip, which has a 10-core CPU. The laptop achieved a score of 17,073 for multi-core CPU performance, whereas the MacBook Air with an M4 chip has an average multi-core score of 14,731, so the new model is up to 15% faster than the previous generation. This is in line with what Apple advertised when it announced the M5 chip back in October, so it was entirely expected.

With the M5 chip, the Geekbench database shows that the MacBook Air is up to 16% faster than the MacBook Pro with the M3 Pro chip from a few years ago, but it is still slower than MacBook Pro models with the M4 Pro chip and newer.

The new MacBook Air is available to pre-order now and launches on Wednesday, March 11.

For additional benchmarks, see our coverage of Geekbench results for the MacBook Pro with the M5 Max chip and the MacBook Neo with the A18 Pro chip.

Article Link: Here's How Much Faster MacBook Air Gets With M5 Chip vs. M4 Chip
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I’m kinda surprised they didn’t add a 3rd USB C port to the right side to more differentiate it from the Neo and previous air.

I guess in apple world usb c ports on each side is a pro feature .

I’d actually happily trade the headphone jack for it since apples own usb c EarPods actually sound way better than the original .
 
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In UK can get MBA M4 16/512 for £999 on Amazon UK right now. Its tempting, but its also tempting just to pay the extra £100 and get the M5 model for the most upto date tech. It needs to last me 10 years like my MBP 2015.
 
I purchased another M4 Air just to have another machine able to run Sequoia. The M5 Air may be 15% faster (CPU) than M4 Air but it is 5000% worse due to Anal Dye's Liquid Ass Tahoe garbage OS.

We'll see what Lemay and WWDC 2026 bring with v27 but optimism is not large because Apple never admits mistakes and is likelier to polish the turd to a deep shine than to backtrack on all the obvious ugly dumbery of Tahoe garbage.
 
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gusping said:
Whoever posts these Geekbench score articles needs to learn about tables. Having a pure text article for this topic makes zero sense.
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From what I’ve seen from this site, there will be an article coming later that includes such a table, that lists out in detail all the differences, including the various performance deltas. But also includes core differences, neural accelerators in the M5, etc.
 
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gusping said:
The MBA M4 16/256GB has been as low as £760 at Costco last Nov. I also pulled the trigger....
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Nice, i'm not a member of Costco but that is an incredible deal you got. I been also eyeing MBA M1 on Laptops Direct brand new for £524, but its maybe a bit too old now in terms of future updates (but perfectly capable).
 
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snipr125 said:
Nice, i'm not a member of Costco but that is an incredible deal you got. I been also eyeing MBA M1 on Laptops Direct brand new for £524, but its maybe a bit too old now in terms of future updates (but perfectly capable).
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I didn't go for in the end. I recently bought a refurbed M4 Mac from Apple, but I did buy an M4 13in iPP 512gb + cellular for £900 from Costco. A nice saving on the M4 or M5 equivalent. Should last me another 5 or so years.
 
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So basically don't upgrade from an M4 Air to an M5 Air obviously.

Also if you don't have one currently, buy an M4 Air on sale over on M5 Air.

Pretty standard advice anyway for most products.
 
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"With the M5 chip, the Geekbench database shows that the MacBook Air is up to 16% faster than the MacBook Pro with the M3 Pro chip from a few years ago, but it is still slower than MacBook Pro models with the M4 Pro chip and newer."

I can play this game too:

A mouse can run faster than a sloth, but the sloth has more fur than a turtle, but a turtle can live longer than a mouse.
 
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It will be interesting to see how these benchmark improvements translate into real world performance. macOS 26 has had a lot of optimization since its release. 26.3 is basically neck and neck with 15.7.4 overall but with improvements in Metal 4, SMB, APFS, and some other areas. It uses a little more RAM and battery though.

If people are doing video or 3D work, the Metal 4 optimizations in 26 put it ahead of 15; it's worth the upgrade, IMO. I've also seen a little faster disk I/O with 26 -- not a lot, but maybe 10% faster with large data migrations.
 
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