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Is M1 app opening really that snappy though?

Sovon Halder

Sovon Halder

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Dec 3, 2016
563
181
India
I think the depiction of snappiness showed on video on today's event was misleading.

I've been using M1 Mac Mini 16GB 256GB since it came out but when I open my apps, it nearly not as snappy as shown on apple's video. In my computer at least it takes half a second to open apps like messages etc (after boot).

I'm curious to hear what the community thinks about it.
 
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I'm not a heavy user but for me on the Air 8gb 512gb is like that, even non native apps are working like that and even opening RAW pictures on old sony mac software is fast.
 
The apps were already running in the background probably. That way it opens right away.
 
eyetic said:
I'm not a heavy user but for me on the Air 8gb 512gb is like that, even non native apps are working like that and even opening RAW pictures on old sony mac software is fast.
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There is an issue with "scaling" (I think) for preview in Big Sur on external displays. But that isn't related to system being snappy in terms of opening apps.

Feyl said:
The apps were already running in the background probably. That way it opens right away.
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Yeah. Misleading. I wish Apple didn't do that.
 
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If it’s already in memory it’s pretty instant, this is what I’ve found with my mini. But an argument for running apps in the background could also be made. It would also be false advertising, so I don’t believe it’s what Apple were demonstrating personally.
 
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Sovon Halder said:
I think the depiction of snappiness showed on video on today's event was misleading.

I've been using M1 Mac Mini 16GB 256GB since it came out but when I open my apps, it nearly not as snappy as shown on apple's video. In my computer at least it takes half a second to open apps like messages etc (after boot).

I'm curious to hear what the community thinks about it.
Click to expand...
I agree. While some apps open almost instantly, or withing a few seconds, others take 10-20 seconds. I mean, it's not the end of the world, but it's definitely not instant.
 
Office for Mac bounces A LOT in my experience (the latest 365 version, universal version) - subsequent launches are noticeable. The rest is pretty snappy :)
 
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It takes me 6-7 seconds to open word or excel after boot.
Rest is "snappy" with a big asterisk (specially after the event video) but definitely NOT instant.
 
8gb/512gb Pro

I find it heavily dependent on what else is running in the background. Lightroom+Firefox bogs the system and makes everything slow to the point that I've been going back to my old 2012 15" for Lightroom.

That was a big shock to me frankly.
 
I just rebooted my M1 Mac, opened Photos and it didn't even bounce once before it opened. YMMV.
 
It's not that snappy. M1 Macbook Pro 256/8. Big deal has been made of this, but it was never that snappy for me.

Btw for me some default apps, like AppStore (...), take a while to load. Not saying the M1 isn't fast, it is, it's just been built up too much.
 
How is half a second not snappy?

The only apps on my M1 MBP base model that are "slow", are the office 365 apps.
And even those apps are fast in my opinion.

I do get you with the misleading part but I cannot recall any business that aren't misleading consumers so I think it's better to take a deep breath and move on. :)
 
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Its certinally way faster than my 32G i9 late 2019 15" MBP! - M1 16G/512G Mini (11.3 RC1)
20sec after cold boot and background activity has died down. 2/3rds faster to launch 2nd time round:

Messages2.1s
Word to file open1.67s
Excel to file open1.71s
Powerpoint to file open1.46s
Garage Band to project load/create5.04s
Firefox to blank page1.79s
Spotify - Electron app's are slow and reflect broadband performance rather than processing in this instance. This was the time taken to finish populating the landing page.9.75s
 
Sovon Halder said:
Photos is the fastest app I've come across, in terms of opening. Try messages. It'll tell you a different story.
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I have an Intel i5 Air.

After booting, the Photos icon bounces just once. That's the minimum for me that any app con bounces in the dock. it isn't possible (unless the app is already open/minimised) for an app to start without the icon moving that once.

Messages bounces twice on first open but there seems to be a slight delay after the second bounce before the app window shows, so there would have been time for a third bounce.
 
Sovon Halder said:
I've been using M1 Mac Mini 16GB 256GB since it came out but when I open my apps, it nearly not as snappy as shown on apple's video. In my computer at least it takes half a second to open apps like messages etc (after boot).
Click to expand...

MacOS needs a bit more time to open an application for the first time after boot since it has to perform a lot of validation (such as developer certificate checking which requires a trip to the Apple servers). But subsequent launches should be pretty much instantaneous, even if the app was completely quit and removed from memory.

These machines are basically designed to be always on, and to be put in the sleep mode rather than turned off. Apple does not optimize for the "cold boot" case.
 
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