The MacBook Pro 16 M3 Max benchmark results are in — and they will shock you

Did you know a slew of new CPUs just launched from Apple? So there’s an M3, M3 Pro, and M3 Max versions of the MacBook Pro 14 and MacBook Pro 16. Well, I wouldn’t be surprised if you didn’t, as Apple launched them in a quick-turnaround event called Scary Fast.

But we have the MacBook Pro 16 M3 Max, and we have tested it. I’ll be honest, with how quick Apple shot out this event and how late it was — I was expecting something a little less shocking. In fact, I would’ve bet that it would have been a mild performance increase at best.

Well, the MacBook Pro 16 M3 Max test results are here to prove me utterly wrong.

MacBook Pro 16 M3 Max benchmarks

First thing’s first, the Apple MacBook Pro 16 that we tested comes with the M3 Max 16-core CPU and 40-core GPU.

On the Geekbench 5.5 overall performance test, the MacBook Pro 16 scored a whopping 23,159. If you’re curious, that destroys the average premium laptop (7,872). But what’s more impressive is how it leaps over the MacBook Pro 16 with M2 Max (15,044).

This is a synthetic performance test, so it doesn’t necessarily measure real-world performance, but it gives us a pretty good idea of which is more powerful. And like it or not, the M3 Max is in a different class — displaying a ~65% increase in performance.

It’s not just its predecessor that the MacBook Pro 16 M3 Max blows away — it’s the most powerful competitors around, including the Intel Core i9-13900H (14,068) and the AMD Ryzen 9 7845HX (13,430). Not the Intel Core i9-12950HX (15,353) nor the Intel Core i9-12900H (14,386) came close, either.

Meanwhile, on our HandBrake benchmark, the MacBook Pro 16 M3 Max transcoded a 4K video to 1080p in just 2 minutes and 36 seconds. The MacBook Pro 16 M2 took 3 minutes and 59 seconds. The average premium laptop takes 8 minutes.

Don’t get too excited about the SSD — we didn’t notice any improvements there. The BlackMagic read/write score hit 5,039/6,273 megabytes per second, while the previous MacBook reached 5,717/6,665 MBps. If anything, it’s slower.

Outlook

The MacBook Pro 16 M3 Max might just be one of the most powerful laptops. It’s more shocking that Apple’s exorbitant prices actually match with the level of performance it delivers. Keep in mind that we are talking about CPU performance here.

When it comes to graphics, however, we’re going to need more time to see what is cooking underneath that hood. Despite the impressive showing that the CPU delivered, I am not expecting a lot from the GPU. We still haven’t seen a flow of modern games launching on macOS, so clearly this device isn’t fully intended for that.

But when it comes to video-editing and photo-editing, will the CPU be enough to carry it through? We’ll have to find out with more rigorous testing. For now, follow along with Laptop Mag on Twitter, Facebook, and Flipboard for the latest word as it arrives.