Home / CPU Comparison / Apple M2 Pro or Apple M6 12 Cores: What's better?

Apple M2 Pro

vs

Apple M6 12 Cores

CPU Comparison Result

Below are the results of a comparison of Apple M2 Pro and Apple M6 12 Cores processors based on key performance characteristics, as well as power consumption and much more.

Advantages

Apple M2 Pro

Higher Memory Type: Unified LPDDR5-6400 (Unified LPDDR5-6400 vs Unified memory)

Apple M6 12 Cores

Higher Technology: 2 nm (5 nm vs 2 nm)
Newer Launch Date: August 2026 (January 2023 vs August 2026)

Basic

Apple

Label Name

Apple

January 2023

Launch Date

August 2026

Laptop

Platform

Laptop

Apple Avalanche + Apple Blizzard

CPU Architecture

Apple M2 Pro

CPU Name

Apple M6

Apple M2 Pro

Model Name

The Intel processor number is just one of several factors - along with processor brand, system configurations, and system-level benchmarks - to be considered when choosing the right processor for your computing needs.

Apple M6 12 Cores

TSMC

Foundry

TSMC N2

Apple M2 series

Generation

CPU Specifications

Performance-core Multi-Core Max Frequency

4.61 GHz

Super-core Max Frequency

4.80 GHz

Total Cores

Cores is a hardware term that describes the number of independent central processing units in a single computing component (die or chip).

Total Threads

Where applicable, Intel® Hyper-Threading Technology is only available on Performance-cores.

Performance-cores

Efficient-cores

Super-cores

2.424 GHz

Efficient-core Max Turbo Frequency

Maximum E-core turbo frequency derived from Intel® Turbo Boost Technology.

3.20 GHz

NEON

Instruction Set Extensions

3.504 GHz

Performance-core Max Turbo Frequency

Maximum P-core turbo frequency derived from Intel® Turbo Boost Technology.

ARMv8-A, NEON

Extended Instruction Set

P-cores: 192 KB instruction + 128 KB data per core; E-cores: 128 KB instruction + 64 KB data per core

L1 Cache

P-core cluster: 36 MB; E-core cluster: 4 MB

L2 Cache

24 MB system level cache

L3 Cache

5 nm

Technology

Lithography refers to the semiconductor technology used to manufacture an integrated circuit, and is reported in nanometer (nm), indicative of the size of features built on the semiconductor.

2 nm

ARMv8-A

Instruction Set

The instruction set is a hard program stored inside the CPU that guides and optimizes CPU operations. With these instruction sets, the CPU can run more efficiently. There are many manufacturers that design CPUs, which results in different instruction sets, such as the 8086 instruction set for the Intel camp and the RISC instruction set for the ARM camp. x86, ARM v8, and MIPS are all codes for instruction sets. Instruction sets can be extended; for example, x86 added 64-bit support to create x86-64. Manufacturers developing CPUs that are compatible with a certain instruction set need authorization from the instruction set patent holder. A typical example is Intel authorizing AMD, enabling the latter to develop CPUs compatible with the x86 instruction set.

40 billion

Transistor Count

Memory Specifications

256-bit

Memory Bus Width

Unified LPDDR5-6400

Memory Type

Intel® processors come in four different types: Single Channel, Dual Channel, Triple Channel, and Flex Mode. Maximum supported memory speed may be lower when populating multiple DIMMs per channel on products that support multiple memory channels.

Unified memory

LPDDR5-6400

LPDDR5 Speed

10667 MT/s

32 GB

Max Memory Size

Max memory size refers to the maximum memory capacity supported by the processor.

32 GB

200 GB/s

Max Memory Bandwidth

Max Memory bandwidth is the maximum rate at which data can be read from or stored into a semiconductor memory by the processor (in GB/s).

170 GB/s

6400 MT/s

Maximum Memory Speed

GPU Specifications

Thunderbolt 4, HDMI 2.1

External Display Standard

DisplayPort 1.4 over Thunderbolt 4; HDMI

Apple M2 Pro GPU

GPU Name

Apple M6 12-core GPU

Hardware-accelerated ray tracing

Supported

Up to two 6K 60Hz displays over Thunderbolt, or one 8K 60Hz display over HDMI

Max External Display Resolution

Up to 8K at 60Hz or 5K at 120Hz or 4K at 240Hz

Multiple streams of 4K and 8K ProRes video

Video Concurrency

H.264, HEVC, ProRes, ProRes RAW

Video Decode

H.264, HEVC, ProRes, ProRes RAW, AV1

H.264, HEVC, ProRes, ProRes RAW

Video Encode

H.264, HEVC, ProRes, ProRes RAW

Apple media engine with ProRes acceleration

Video Processing Unit

1398 MHz

GPU Max Dynamic Frequency

444 MHz

Graphics Base Frequency

Graphics Base frequency refers to the rated/guaranteed graphics render clock frequency in MHz.

Graphics Core Count

Max Resolution

Up to 8K at 60Hz or 5K at 120Hz or 4K at 240Hz

Up to 2 external displays

Number of Displays Supported

Metal, OpenCL

GPU APIs

Up to 6.8 TFLOPS FP32

Graphics Performance

Hardware-accelerated H.264, HEVC, ProRes, and ProRes RAW

Media Engine

Hardware-accelerated H.264, HEVC, ProRes and ProRes RAW; AV1 decode

Video Decode Engines

Video Encode Engines

ProRes Encode/Decode Engines

Yes

OpenCL Support

OpenCL (Open Computing Language) is a multi-platform API (Application Programming Interface) for heterogeneous parallel programming.

AI Specifications

16-core Apple Neural Engine

AI Engine

Dual 16-core Neural Engine; Neural Accelerators in each GPU core

Neural Engine Core Count

Apple Neural Engine

NPU Name

Dual 16-core Neural Engine

15.8 TOPS

NPU Performance

Connectivity

Yes

Bluetooth Support

Bluetooth 5.3

Bluetooth Version

Wi-Fi 6E (802.11ax)

Wi-Fi Standard

Interfaces and Ports

Yes, Thunderbolt 4 up to 40 Gb/s

Thunderbolt Support

Thunderbolt 4

USB4

USB Version

Yes, USB4 up to 40 Gb/s

USB4 Support

Supported

Miscellaneous

Yes, Apple silicon secure boot chain of trust

Hardware-Verified Secure Boot

Apple image signal processor

Image Signal Processor

Kernel Integrity Protection, Fast Permission Restrictions, System Coprocessor Integrity Protection, Pointer Authentication Codes, Secure Page Table Monitor

Runtime Anti-Exploitation