Apple A15 Bionic (5-GPU) vs Apple M1. Specifications, performance, tests

Background information about the processors being compared, series, generation and market segment.

• Family
  Apple A series Apple M series
• CPU group
  Apple A15 Apple M1
• Segment
  Mobile Mobile
• Generation
  15 1
• Predecessor
  Apple A14 Bionic --

Basic parameters such as number of cores, number of threads, base and turbo frequency, and cache size. These parameters indirectly tell about the speed of the processor, the higher they are the better.

• Core architecture
  hybrid (big.LITTLE) hybrid (big.LITTLE)
• Frequency
  3.23 GHz 3.20 GHz
• Turbo (1 Core)
  No turbo No turbo
• Hyperthreading
  No No
• Overclocking
  No No

Internal Graphics does not affect the performance of the CPU, performs the work of the graphics card in its absence or on mobile devices.

• GPU name
  Apple A15 (5 GPU Cores) Apple M1 (8 Core)
• GPU frequency
  0.60 GHz 3.20 GHz
• GPU (Turbo)
  No turbo No turbo
• Execution units
  160 128
• Shader
  1280 0
• Max. GPU Memory
  8 GB 8 GB
• Max. displays
  3 2
• Generation
  12 1
• Technology
  5 nm 5 nm
• Release date
  Q3/2021 Q4/2020

Built-in codecs used to encode and decode content. Significantly speeds up the required operations.

• h265 / HEVC (8 bit)
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• h265 / HEVC (10 bit)
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• h264
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• VP8
  Decode / Encode Decode
• VP9
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode
• AV1
  No Decode
• AVC
  Decode Decode
• VC-1
  Decode Decode
• JPEG
  Decode / Encode Decode / Encode

Types, channel quantity of RAM supported by Apple M1 and Apple A15 Bionic (5-GPU). Depending on the motherboards, higher or lower memory frequencies may be supported.

• Memory type
  LPDDR4X-4266 LPDDR4X-4266
• Max. Memory
  8 GB 16 GB
• Memory channels
  1 2
• ECC
  No No

Compare the TDP requirements of TDP Apple A15 Bionic (5-GPU) and Apple M1 to select a cooling system. Note, the TDP value refers to thermal watts, not electrical watts.

• TDP (PL1)
  8.5 W 15 W
• TDP up
  -- 20 W
• TDP down
  -- 10 W

Architecture, interfaces, additional instructions supported by Apple A15 Bionic (5-GPU) and Apple A15 Bionic (5-GPU), virtual machine technologies and process technology.

• Instruction set (ISA)
  ARMv8-A64 (64 bit) ARMv8-A64 (64 bit)
• ISA extensions
  Rosetta 2 x86-Emulation
• L2-Cache
  16.00 MB 16.00 MB
• Architecture
  A15 M1
• Technology
  5 nm 5 nm
• Virtualization
  None None
• Socket
  N/A N/A
• Release date
  Q3/2021 Q4/2020