M4 Pro vs M5 for same price?

[Southernboyj]

My local Best Buy has an open box M4 Pro MBP 14" in open box excellent for $1,600. I've already looked at it and it looks brand-new, has 1 charge cycle, and was purchased and returned last week so I think the buyer just had buyers remorse.

For the same price would you choose the M5/16GB/512GB or M4 Pro/24GB/512GB?

 

[Apple_Robert]

I would get the M5. I can't see needing much less using 24GB of RAM on the M4.

 

[casperes1996]

I would choose the M4 Pro no doubt. But I don’t think that’s the right choice for everyone. For the consumer who really doesn’t have any demanding workloads, the M5 could be better. It’s faster for single threaded operations where memory isn’t a concern and might provide one more year of software support down the road. To those for whom it matters it also has better ai performance when not memory bound. M4 Pro has more general horsepower.

But it depends on the use case

 

[raythompsontn]

I would opt for the M4 Pro. Thunderbolt 5. Better screen and more memory. SDXC slot. In the majority of use you will not need the increased speed of the M5. The M5 does not have Thunderbolt 5. I think that will become more important in the future. Those that need that extra speed know who they are and will not be debating between the M4 and M5. The additional memory on the M4, better screen, and Thunderbolt 5 will serve you better. Just my opinion.

 

[Southernboyj]

I would opt for the M4 Pro. Thunderbolt 5. Better screen and more memory. SDXC slot. In the majority of use you will not need the increased speed of the M5. The M5 does not have Thunderbolt 5. I think that will become more important in the future. Those that need that extra speed know who they are and will not be debating between the M4 and M5. The additional memory on the M4, better screen, and Thunderbolt 5 will serve you better. Just my opinion.

They both have the exact screen, body, and both have the SDXC slot.

 

[haralds]

I am very, very happy with my M4 Pro - 24GB/2TB.
The screen, sound, performance, battery life, and form factor are all great.

 

[Southernboyj]

I am very, very happy with my M4 Pro - 24GB/2TB.
The screen, sound, performance, battery life, and form factor are all great.

I sent with the M4 Pro 14". I'm coming from a MBP 16" M1 Max. Bought the 16" new back in 2021 and just grew tired of the size and weight. A few hours in and so far the weight and size of this one feels really nice.

 

[raythompsontn]

They both have the exact screen, body, and both have the SDXC slot.

Thanks for the correction. For some unknown reason I was thinking M4 Air when I clearly typed Pro. Doh!

 

[C0re0]

Hi,

Overall, M4pro and M5 are almost on par.

As already mentioned, M5 as better single core performance, M4pro better multicore performance.
Regarding graphics (gaming and 3D-intensive tasks) chips are almost identical.

Apple M5 (10-Core) vs M4 Pro (12-Core): performance comparison

We compared Apple M5 (10-Core) (4.61 GHz) against M4 Pro (12-Core) (4.51 GHz) in games and benchmarks. Find out which CPU has better performance.

nanoreview.net

However, if you need more power, wait for the M5pro chips which will be released early 2026 (rumors).

 

[JSRinUK]

All else being equal, I’d go with the M4 Pro. If the MacBook does some heavy lifting at times you’ll probably appreciate the dual-fans over the single fan of the M5. And the TB5 ports vs TB4 might actually be more “future proof” for your use case than the newer M5 chip.

If you do any light AI work, the 24GB RAM and 273GB/sec memory bandwidth might serve you better over the 16GB/153 of the M5. The dual-fans would help in this scenario, too.

And, although it doesn’t apply to your case, if anyone finds the same price-matched deal in Europe, the M4 Pro would actually be the cheaper buy because you wouldn’t have to pay £60 for the power brick.

I have the M4 Pro MBP (24GB/1TB), which is the 14/20, and I wouldn’t swap it for the base MBP.

 

[cjsuk]

M4 Pro here. Definitely would go for that. More cores. More bandwidth.

 

[C0re0]

All else being equal, I’d go with the M4 Pro. If the MacBook does some heavy lifting at times you’ll probably appreciate the dual-fans over the single fan of the M5. And the TB5 ports vs TB4 might actually be more “future proof” for your use case than the newer M5 chip.

If you do any light AI work, the 24GB RAM and 273GB/sec memory bandwidth might serve you better over the 16GB/153 of the M5. The dual-fans would help in this scenario, too.

And, although it doesn’t apply to your case, if anyone finds the same price-matched deal in Europe, the M4 Pro would actually be the cheaper buy because you wouldn’t have to pay £60 for the power brick.

I have the M4 Pro MBP (24GB/1TB), which is the 14/20, and I wouldn’t swap it for the base MBP.

I agree.

Anyway, Whatever decision is made, I would definitely go with at least 24 GB of RAM.
I have a MBP M5 with 24 GB RAM, using Luminar Neo for foto editing (with AI). Processing takes only seconds; and the fan is not even audible.

 

[Hooyah]

It really comes down to your usage needs.

The open box one is likely beyond being able to have Apple Care added to it, in case that matters to you

 

[JPack]

M4 Pro significantly outperforms M5 in almost everything including gaming. There's a couple rare single thread workloads where it's not true, but those are very corner cases. M4P clobbers the M5 in core count and memory bandwidth.

Perfect condition M4P? I'd get that.