Home > CPU Comparison > Core Ultra 5 125U or Apple M2: what's better?

Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Apple M2

48 out of 100
Intel Core Ultra 5 125U
VS
57 out of 100
Apple M2
Intel Core Ultra 5 125U
Apple M2

We compared two laptop CPUs: the 1.3 GHz Intel Core Ultra 5 125U with 12-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 (2)

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 125U
Advantages of Intel Core Ultra 5 125U
  • Supports up to 96 GB LPDDR5-7467 RAM
  • Newer - released 1 year and 7 months later
  • Has 4 more physical cores
Advantages of Apple M2
  • More powerful Apple M2 GPU integrated graphics: 2.9 vs 1.9 TFLOPS
  • More modern manufacturing process – 5 versus 7 nanometers
  • 23% faster in a single-core Geekbench v6 test - 2589 vs 2113 points
  • Around 12.8 GB/s (14%) higher theoretical memory bandwidth

Test in Benchmarks

Comparing the performance of CPUs across various tasks
CPU:
Core Ultra 5 125U
vs
Apple M2

Cinebench

Reputable cross-platform benchmark for high-performance processors
Cinebench 2024 (Single)
Cinebench 2024 (Multi)
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 Ultra 5 125U
2113
Apple M2 +23%
2589
Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)
Core Ultra 5 125U
9136
Apple M2 +11%
10122
File compression 958.1 MB/sec 1130 MB/sec
Clang compilation 65.6 Klines/sec 80.4 Klines/sec
HTML 5 Browser 223.8 pages/sec 235.3 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 243.9 Mpixels/sec 266.1 Mpixels/sec
Text processing 213.2 pages/sec 257.4 pages/sec
Background blur 40.3 images/sec 42.1 images/sec
Photo processing 93.4 images/sec 107 images/sec
Ray tracing 13.8 Mpixels/sec 10.5 Mpixels/sec
Sources: GeekBench [1], [2] – 18 & 465 samples

PassMark

Synthetic test that focuses on raw computational performance for low-level functions
Passmark CPU (Single-Core)
Core Ultra 5 125U
3241
Apple M2 +20%
3883
Passmark CPU (Multi-Core)
Core Ultra 5 125U +7%
16758
Apple M2
15651
Integer math 55.8 GOps/sec 37 GOps/sec
Floating point math 40.2 GOps/sec 37.5 GOps/sec
Find prime numbers 64M Primes/sec 174M Primes/sec
Random string sorting 20.8M Strings/sec 23.7M Strings/sec
Data encryption 11.7 GBytes/sec 9.5 GBytes/sec
Data compression 188.5 MBytes/sec 185.8 MBytes/sec
Physics 1063 Frames/sec 1667 Frames/sec
Extended instructions 10.7B Matrices/sec 7.8B Matrices/sec
Sources: PassMark [3], [4] – 2202 & 4611 samples

Blender

3D rendering test that measures CPU performance in 3D modeling tasks (uses all cores)
Blender CPU
Core Ultra 5 125U
109.62
Apple M2
109.19

Performance Per Watt

Shows the score you get per each watt of PL1 TDP
Cinebench 2024 / Watt 41.1 PPW 32.3 PPW
Geekbench 6 Multi / Watt 761.3 PPW 562.3 PPW
Passmark CPU Mark / Watt 1396.5 PPW 869.5 PPW
Blender / Watt 9.14 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 Ultra 5 125U
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 Ultra 5 125U and Apple M2

General

Vendor Intel Apple
Released December 14, 2023 June 6, 2022
Type Laptop Laptop
Instruction Set x86-64 ARMv8
Codename Meteor Lake Apple M2
Model number 125U -
Integrated GPU Arc Graphics (4-Cores) Apple M2 GPU
Rival Equivalent - AMD Ryzen 5 8540U -
Successor - Intel Core Ultra 5 225U - Apple M5 (10-Core)
Intel CPU rating (#169th place)

CPU

Performance Cores
P-Cores 2 4
P-Threads 4 4
Base Frequency (P) 1.3 GHz 3.5 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (P) 4.3 GHz -
Efficient Cores
E-Cores 10 4
E-Threads 10 4
Base Frequency (E) 0.8 GHz 2.4 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (E) 3.6 GHz -
Total
Total Cores 12 8
Total Threads 14 8
Bus Frequency 100 MHz -
Multiplier 13x -
L1 Cache 112K (per core) 192K (per core)
L2 Cache 2MB (per core) 16MB (shared)
L3 Cache 12MB (shared) -
Unlocked Multiplier No No

Package

Transistors - 20 billions
Fabrication Process 7 nm 5 nm
TDP (PL1) 12 W 18 W
Max. Boost TDP (PL2) 57 W -
Socket FCBGA-2049 Apple M-Socket
Peak Temperature 110Β°C -

iGPU

Integrated Graphics Arc Graphics (4-Cores) Apple M2 GPU
GPU Base Clock 300 MHz 500 MHz
GPU Boost Clock 1850 MHz 1398 MHz
Shading Units 512 1024
TMUs 32 64
ROPs 16 32
Execution Units 64 128
TGP 14 W 15 W
iGPU FLOPS
Core Ultra 5 125U
1.9 TFLOPS
Apple M2 +53%
2.9 TFLOPS
More info: Apple M2 GPU (8-core) compared to Arc iGPU (4-Cores)

Memory Support

Memory Types - LPDDR5-7467
- LPDDR5x-7467
- DDR5-5600		 - LPDDR5-6400
Max. Memory Size 96 GB 24 GB
Memory Channels 2 8
Max. Memory Bandwidth 89.6 GB/s 102.4 GB/s
ECC Support No No

Misc

Official Site Intel Core Ultra 5 125U official page -
PCI Express Version 4.0 4.0
PCI Express Lanes 20 -

Cast your vote

Choose between two processors
64 (53.8%)
55 (46.2%)
Total votes: 119

Competitors

1. Apple M2 vs Apple M2 Pro (2)
2. Apple M2 vs Apple M4 (10-Core)
3. Apple M2 vs Intel Core i7 12700H (2)
4. Apple M2 vs Intel Core i5 12500H (7)
5. Apple M2 vs Apple M3
6. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core i5 1235U
7. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core i5 1335U (1)
8. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core i7 1355U
9. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs Intel Core Ultra 5 125H
10. Intel Core Ultra 5 125U vs AMD Ryzen 5 8540U
Compare other CPUs (460+)

Comments

So which CPU will you choose: Apple M2 or Intel Core Ultra 5 125U?
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Avatar
ComputerNerd December 20, 2023 at 04:46 AM
It is close, but I give the edge to the M2 CPU. Slightly better performance on the CPU, and more TFLOPS power for the GPU.
0 Reply
Avatar
Robby October 3, 2024 at 09:18 AM
Yeah but look at the price you pay and both have a similiar battery life.
0 Reply
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