Home > CPU Comparison > Core i9 12900HX or Apple M2: what's better?

Intel Core i9 12900HX vs Apple M2

60 out of 100
Intel Core i9 12900HX
VS
57 out of 100
Apple M2
Intel Core i9 12900HX
Apple M2

We compared two laptop CPUs: the 2.3 GHz Intel Core i9 12900HX with 16-cores against the 3.5 GHz Apple M2 with 8-cores. On this page, you'll find out which processor has better performance in benchmarks, games and other useful information.

  1. Review
  2. Differences
  3. Performance
  4. Specs
  5. Comments

Review

General overview and comparison of the processors
Single-Core Performance
Performance in single-threaded apps and benchmarks
Multi-Core Performance
Measure performance when all cores are involved
Power Efficiency
The efficiency score of power consumption
Integrated Graphics
iGPU capabilities for gaming and 3D-intensive tasks
NanoReview Final Score
Choose your main usage scenario to recalculate the Final Score and see which CPU suits your needs.
πŸ”Œ Usage Scenario:

Key Differences

What are the key differences between M2 and 12900HX
Advantages of Intel Core i9 12900HX
  • Supports up to 128 GB DDR5-4800 RAM
  • Has 8 more physical cores
  • Unlocked multiplier
  • Newer PCI Express version – 5.0
Advantages of Apple M2
  • More powerful Apple M2 GPU integrated graphics: 2.9 vs 0.8 TFLOPS
  • More modern manufacturing process – 5 versus 10 nanometers
  • Around 25.6 GB/s (33%) higher theoretical memory bandwidth

Test in Benchmarks

Comparing the performance of CPUs across various tasks
CPU:
Core i9 12900HX
vs
Apple M2

Cinebench

Reputable cross-platform benchmark for high-performance processors
Cinebench 2024 (Single)
Core i9 12900HX
112
Apple M2 +12%
125
Cinebench 2024 (Multi)
Core i9 12900HX +118%
1269
Apple M2
582
Cinebench Scores (#102nd place)
Submit your benchmark results

GeekBench v6

The new version of this benchmark emulates common operations often used in real-world apps
Geekbench 6 (Single-Core)
Core i9 12900HX
2517
Apple M2 +3%
2589
Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)
Core i9 12900HX +43%
14457
Apple M2
10122
File compression 1110 MB/sec 1130 MB/sec
Clang compilation 121.1 Klines/sec 80.4 Klines/sec
HTML 5 Browser 336.5 pages/sec 235.3 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 382.4 Mpixels/sec 266.1 Mpixels/sec
Text processing 254 pages/sec 257.4 pages/sec
Background blur 58.1 images/sec 42.1 images/sec
Photo processing 116.9 images/sec 107 images/sec
Ray tracing 29.6 Mpixels/sec 10.5 Mpixels/sec
Sources: GeekBench [1], [2] – 438 & 465 samples

PassMark

Synthetic test that focuses on raw computational performance for low-level functions
Passmark CPU (Single-Core)
Core i9 12900HX
3746
Apple M2 +4%
3883
Passmark CPU (Multi-Core)
Core i9 12900HX +110%
32932
Apple M2
15651
Integer math 112.6 GOps/sec 37 GOps/sec
Floating point math 83.7 GOps/sec 37.5 GOps/sec
Find prime numbers 132M Primes/sec 174M Primes/sec
Random string sorting 43.6M Strings/sec 23.7M Strings/sec
Data encryption 22.7 GBytes/sec 9.5 GBytes/sec
Data compression 396.2 MBytes/sec 185.8 MBytes/sec
Physics 2020 Frames/sec 1667 Frames/sec
Extended instructions 24.1B Matrices/sec 7.8B Matrices/sec
Sources: PassMark [3], [4] – 515 & 4611 samples

Blender

3D rendering test that measures CPU performance in 3D modeling tasks (uses all cores)
Blender CPU
Core i9 12900HX +180%
305.67
Apple M2
109.19

Performance Per Watt

Shows the score you get per each watt of PL1 TDP
Cinebench 2024 / Watt 23.1 PPW 32.3 PPW
Geekbench 6 Multi / Watt 262.9 PPW 562.3 PPW
Passmark CPU Mark / Watt 598.8 PPW 869.5 PPW
Blender / Watt 5.56 PPW 6.07 PPW
These are rough calculations, as most CPUs surpass PL1 TDP wattage even in multicore workloads.

Recent User Tests

The latest benchmark tests that have been submitted by users
Intel Core i9 12900HX
No benchmark results yet
Add
Apple M2
DateBenchmarkResult
πŸ“˜ 2026-03-14 (T)Geekbench 6 CPU2647 / 10245
πŸ“˜ 2026-01-05 (AR)Geekbench 6 CPU2655 / 10211
πŸ“˜ 2025-10-24 (Shivam)Geekbench 6 CPU2619 / 9900
Add View all (3)

Specifications

Full technical specification of Intel Core i9 12900HX and Apple M2

General

Vendor Intel Apple
Released May 10, 2022 June 6, 2022
Type Laptop Laptop
Instruction Set x86-64 ARMv8
Codename Alder Lake Apple M2
Model number i9-12900HX -
Integrated GPU UHD Graphics (32EU) Apple M2 GPU
Rival Equivalent - AMD Ryzen 9 6900HX -
Successor - Intel Core Ultra 9 285HX - Apple M5 (10-Core)
Intel CPU rating (#86th place)

CPU

Performance Cores
P-Cores 8 4
P-Threads 16 4
Base Frequency (P) 2.3 GHz 3.5 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (P) 5 GHz -
Efficient Cores
E-Cores 8 4
E-Threads 8 4
Base Frequency (E) 1.7 GHz 2.4 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (E) 3.6 GHz -
Total
Total Cores 16 8
Total Threads 24 8
Bus Frequency 100 MHz -
Multiplier 23x -
L1 Cache 80K (per core) 192K (per core)
L2 Cache 1280K (per core) 16MB (shared)
L3 Cache 30MB (shared) -
Unlocked Multiplier Yes No

Package

Transistors - 20 billions
Fabrication Process 10 nm 5 nm
TDP (PL1) 45-55 W (configurable) 18 W
Max. Boost TDP (PL2) 157 W -
Socket BGA-1964 Apple M-Socket
Peak Temperature 100Β°C -
Laptop processors ranking (108th and 133rd place)

iGPU

Integrated Graphics Intel UHD Graphics (32EU) Apple M2 GPU
GPU Base Clock 300 MHz 500 MHz
GPU Boost Clock 1550 MHz 1398 MHz
Shading Units 256 1024
TMUs 16 64
ROPs 8 32
Execution Units 32 128
TGP 15 W 15 W
iGPU FLOPS
Core i9 12900HX
0.8 TFLOPS
Apple M2 +262%
2.9 TFLOPS
More info: Apple M2 GPU (8-core) compared to UHD Graphics 770

Memory Support

Memory Types - DDR5-4800
- DDR4-3200		 - LPDDR5-6400
Max. Memory Size 128 GB 24 GB
Memory Channels 2 8
Max. Memory Bandwidth 76.8 GB/s 102.4 GB/s
ECC Support No No

Misc

Official Site Intel Core i9 12900HX official page -
PCI Express Version 5.0 4.0
PCI Express Lanes 20 -

Cast your vote

Choose between two processors
124 (48.8%)
130 (51.2%)
Total votes: 254

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Comments

So which CPU will you choose: Apple M2 or Intel Core i9 12900HX?
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