Apple M6 GPU (12-core) vs M5 Ultra GPU (80-core)

We performed a head-to-head comparison of the Apple M6 GPU (12-core) with 192 pipelines and 1536 shaders against the M5 Ultra GPU (80-core) that utilizes 1280 pipelines and 10240 shaders. Here you will find complete details about specs, efficiency, performance tests, and more.

Please note that the tests on the Apple M5 Ultra GPU (80-core) are done on an engineering sample provided by our insiders. The data will be more accurate after the final version of this GPU is available.

Key differences

Key distinctions and advantages of M5 Ultra GPU (80-core) over M6 GPU (12-core)
Reasons to consider the Apple M6 GPU (12-core)
  • Manufactured using a more efficient 2 nm process technology
Reasons to consider the Apple M5 Ultra GPU (80-core)
  • 6.8x higher maximum theoretical performance (33.2 vs 4.9 TFLOPS)
  • Has 7.2x higher memory bandwidth: 1228.8 vs 170 GB/s
  • Has 6.7x more shading units (10240 vs 1536)

Benchmarks

Graphics cards’ performance in recent benchmarking apps

Specifications

Technical specifications of Apple M6 GPU (12-core) and M5 Ultra GPU (80-core)

General

Vendor Apple Apple
Build Integrated Integrated
Released August 25, 2026 August 25, 2026
Case Laptop Desktop
Purpose Generic Professional
Segment Mid-range High-end
Architecture Apple M GPU Apple M GPU
GPU Codename Custom Custom
Rival Equivalent - Adreno X2-90 - GeForce RTX 5080
Recommended CPU - Apple M6 (12-Core) or above - Apple M5 Ultra (36-Core) or above
Used in CPUs - Apple M6 (12-Core) - Apple M5 Ultra (36-Core)
Laptop GPU ranking (#27th place)

Graphics Processing Unit

Base Clock - 500 MHz
Boost Clock 1600 MHz 1620 MHz
Shading Units 1536 10240
Texture Mapping Units (TMUs) 96 640
Render Output Units (ROPs) 80 320
Compute Units (Pipelines) 192 1280
Tensor Cores No -
Ray-tracing Cores No -
Instructions Per Cycle 2 IPC 2 IPC

Raw Performance

Pixel Fill Rate 128 GPixel/s 518 GPixel/s
Texture Fill Rate 154 GTexel/s 1037 GTexel/s
FLOPS (FP32)
4.9 TFLOPS
33.2 TFLOPS

Physical

Interface Custom Custom
Manufacturing TSMC TSMC
Fabrication Process 2 nm 3 nm

Memory

Memory Type System Shared System Shared
Memory Clock 10667 MHz 9600 MHz
Bus 128-bit 1024-bit
ECC No No
Memory Bandwidth
170 GB/s
1228.8 GB/s

API

CUDA No -
Ray Tracing Yes Yes
DLSS No No

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