iPad Pro’s A12X Bionic Smokes Most Modern PCs in Performance Tests

Apple on Tuesday took the wraps off a trove of new products including a refreshed MacBook Air, Mac mini desktop, and two entirely redesigned iPad Pro models with updated smart accessories in tow. The iPads were undoubtedly the stars of the show, as Apple dedicated most of its presentation to highlighting the next-generation tablet’s many powerful and game-changing new features.

At the heart of the latest 11 and 12.9-inch iPad Pro models is Apple’s most powerful silicon, the A12X Bionic chip, which the company boldly claimed on stage is faster than over 90 percent of desktop-class PCs available today.

Apple’s A12X is built on the same next-generation 7 nm process as the A12 Bionic powering the iPhone XS, iPhone XS Max and iPhone XR.

But in place of a 6-core CPU configuration like on the A12, the A12X flaunts an 8-core CPU along with a 7-core GPU for managing advanced professional, gaming, and augmented reality apps.

But how does the A12X perform in real-world, head-to-head testing? Now that Apple’s new iPad Pro models are trickling into the hands of early reviewers and bloggers around the web, we’re about to find out!

A12X vs A12 vs Intel i7

According to performance scores generated by Geekbench 4, Apple wasn’t mincing words when it claimed its latest iPad Pros are faster than “92 percent” of PCs out there.

The A12X Bionic scored 5020 in single-core performance, which is just slightly higher than the 5009 generated by Intel’s Coffee Lake (i7-8850H) CPU.

In multi-core testing, the A12X Bionic absolutely stuns with a performance score of 18217, which is significantly higher than the A12 Bionic’s 11,000, but lower, by a hair, in comparison to the 19752 achieved by the same chip powering Apple’s 2018 MacBook Pro, but much faster than the majority of modern i7 chips.

Last year’s 2017 MacBook Pro boasting Intel’s Core i7-4770K manages a multi-core Geekbench 4 score of 15731.

Apple on the Cutting-Edge

Browsing the official Geekbench library of archived scores will reveal a trove of similar comparisons that prove Apple’s A12X Bionic — and its newest 11- and 12.9-inch iPad Pros — are true performance powerhouses.

It’s also interesting to think how Apple’s A-series chips have evolved over the years from the original 1 GHz single-core A4, to the latest A12X with its octa-core configuration that seemingly smokes most of the PC market.

And with Apple positioned to start using A-series chips in some of Mac products starting as early as next year, we can only expect these A-series chips to continue blowing away the competition, as they do, year-after-year.