Home > Smartphone processors comparison > M2 (iPad) vs A16 Bionic โ€“ what's better?

M2 (iPad) vs A16 Bionic

M2 (iPad)
VS
A16 Bionic
M2 (iPad)
A16 Bionic

We compared the 8-core Apple M2 (iPad) (Apple M2 GPU) with the newer 6-core A16 Bionic (Apple A16 GPU) SoC. Here you will find the pros and cons of each chip, technical specs, and comprehensive tests in benchmarks, like AnTuTu and Geekbench.

  1. Review
  2. Differences
  3. Benchmarks
  4. AnTuTu v11
  5. GeekBench 6
  6. Specs
  7. Comments

Review

General comparison of performance, power consumption, and other indicators
CPU Performance
Single and multi-core processor tests
Gaming Performance
GPU performance in games and OpenCL/Vulkan
Battery life
Efficiency of battery consumption
NanoReview Score
Overall chip score

Key Differences

Main differences and advantages of each chip
Pros of Apple M2 (iPad)
  • Supports 100% higher memory bandwidth (102.4 against 51.2 GB/s)
  • Performs 60% better in floating-point computations
  • Shows significantly better (up to 56%) AnTuTu 11 score โ€“ 2536K vs 1626K
  • Has 2 more cores
Pros of Apple A16 Bionic
  • Has a smaller size transistor (4 versus 5 nm)
  • Better instruction set architecture

Benchmarks

Performance tests in popular benchmarks
SoC:
M2 (iPad)
vs
A16 Bionic

AnTuTu 11

The AnTuTu Benchmark measures CPU, GPU, RAM, and I/O performance in different scenarios
M2 (iPad) +56%
2536320
A16 Bionic
1626008
CPU 841074 432740
GPU 801119 490354
Memory 371059 216774
UX 523068 486140
Total score 2536320 1626008
Samples Less than 3 [36 tests]
Submit your AnTuTu result

GeekBench 6

The GeekBench test shows raw single-threaded and multithreaded CPU performance
Single-Core Score
M2 (iPad)
2619
A16 Bionic
2631
Multi-Core Score
M2 (iPad) +53%
10084
A16 Bionic
6602
Asset compression 386.1 MB/sec 234.4 MB/sec
HTML 5 Browser 238.6 pages/sec 155.2 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 269.5 Mpixels/sec 157.5 Mpixels/sec
Image detection 236.7 images/sec 149.7 images/sec
HDR 334.9 Mpixels/sec 202.6 Mpixels/sec
Background blur 42 images/sec 25.9 images/sec
Photo processing 106.5 images/sec 76.8 images/sec
Ray tracing 10.4 Mpixels/sec 6.74 Mpixels/sec
Samples 4 tests 24 tests
Compute Score (GPU)
M2 (iPad) +91%
43561
A16 Bionic
22851
Background blur 74.8 images/sec 39.5 images/sec
Face detection 93.3 images/sec 50.9 images/sec
Horizon detection 1.36 Gpixels/sec 0.73 Gpixels/sec
Edge detection 1.92 Gpixels/sec 1.05 Gpixels/sec
Gaussian blur 2.31 Gpixels/sec 1.22 Gpixels/sec
Feature matching 0.53 Gpixels/sec 0.29 Gpixels/sec
Stereo matching 129.5 Gpixels/sec 70.4 Gpixels/sec
Particle physics 5024.6 FPS 2162.5 FPS
API Metal Metal
Samples 3 tests 12 tests

3DMark

A cross-platform benchmark that assesses graphics performance in Vulkan (Metal)
3DMark Steel Nomad Light
Score 2474 -
Stability 67% -
Graphics test 18 FPS -
3DMark Solar Bay
M2 (iPad) +101%
8572
A16 Bionic
4266
Score 8572 4266
Stability 71% 74%
Graphics test 33 FPS 16 FPS
Section 1 41 FPS 20 FPS
Section 2 33 FPS 16 FPS
Section 3 23 FPS 12 FPS
3DMark Wild Life Extreme
M2 (iPad) +104%
6808
A16 Bionic
3335
Score 6808 3335
Stability 71% 71%
Graphics test 40 FPS 19 FPS

Recent User Tests

The latest benchmark tests that have been submitted by users
Apple M2 (iPad)
No benchmark results yet
Add
Apple A16 Bionic
DateBenchmarkResult
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-09-21 (ะั‚ะพะผะฝะฐั ะฑะพะผะฑะฐ)AnTuTu 111772840
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-09-19 (Bear lover)AnTuTu 111714105
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-09-14 (ZUSEPRO)AnTuTu 111603687
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-08-31 (LORDroid)AnTuTu 111445126
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-08-16 (Ronaldo)AnTuTu 111626008
Add View all (62)

Specifications

Full list of technical specifications of M2 (iPad) and A16 Bionic

CPU

Architecture 4x 3.49 GHz โ€“ Avalanche
4x 2.42 GHz โ€“ Blizzard		 2x 3.46 GHz โ€“ Everest
4x 2.02 GHz โ€“ Sawtooth
Cores 8 6
Frequency 3490 MHz 3460 MHz
Instruction set ARMv8.5-A ARMv8.6-A
L1 cache 192 KB 256 KB
L2 cache 16 MB 16 MB
Process 5 nanometers 4 nanometers
Transistor count 20 billion 16 billion
TDP (Sustained Power Limit) 20 W 8 W
Manufacturing TSMC TSMC

Graphics

GPU name Apple M2 GPU Apple A16 GPU
Architecture Apple GPU Apple Bionic GPU
GPU frequency 1398 MHz 1398 MHz
Pipelines 8 5
Shading units 128 128
Total shaders 1024 640
FLOPS 2863.1 Gigaflops 1789.4 Gigaflops

AI Accelerator

Neural processor (NPU) Apple Neural Engine Apple Neural Engine
NPU theoretical performance 15.8 TOPS 17 TOPS

Memory

Memory type LPDDR5 LPDDR5
Memory frequency 3200 MHz 3200 MHz
Bus 8x 16 Bit 4x 16 Bit
Max bandwidth 102.4 Gb/s 51.2 Gb/s
Max size 24 GB 6 GB

Multimedia (ISP)

Storage type NVMe NVMe
Max display resolution 2732 x 2048 2796 x 1290
Max camera resolution - 1x 48MP
Video capture 4K at 60FPS 4K at 60FPS
Video playback 4K at 60FPS 4K at 60FPS
Video codecs - H.264
- H.265
- VP9		 - H.264
- H.265
- VP8
- VP9
- Motion JPEG
Audio codecs - AAC
- AIFF
- CAF
- MP3
- MP4
- WAV		 - AAC
- AAX
- AAX+
- AC-3
- AIFF
- CAF
- E-AC-3
- MP3
- MP4
- WAV

Connectivity

4G support LTE Cat. 24 LTE Cat. 24
5G support Yes Yes
Download speed Up to 7500 Mbps Up to 7500 Mbps
Upload speed Up to 3000 Mbps Up to 3500 Mbps
Wi-Fi 6 6
Bluetooth 5.0 5.3
Navigation GPS, GLONASS, Galileo, QZSS GPS, GLONASS, Beidou, Galileo, QZSS

Info

Announced June 2022 September 2022
Class Flagship Flagship
Model number APL1109 APL1W10
Successor - Apple M4 (iPad) - Apple A19 Pro

Cast your vote

So, which SoC would you choose?
260 (78.5%)
71 (21.5%)
Total votes: 331

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Comments

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