M2 MacBook Pro 13 with 256 GB storage has a 33-50% slower SSD than its M1 equivalent

Reviews of Apple’s M2-based MacBook Pro 13 have scattered across the Internet like wildfire, and while the laptop has received plenty of justified praise, it appears some of the painted-over cracks have started peeling to reveal some shocking secrets. In this case, a couple of YouTube-based reviewers have discovered that the SSDs in certain configurations of the M2 MacBook Pro 13 appear to have been affected by some crafty cost-cutting. Unfortunately, a lack of current transparency means that a buyer of the 2022 MacBook Pro 13 may be lumbered with a slow SSD if they selected a 256 GB or 512 GB model.

For starters, Max Yuryev at Max Tech discovered that because Apple has only fitted one NAND flash storage chip into the 256 GB model of the M2 MacBook Pro, the SSD test results looked very poor against the 2020 Apple MacBook Pro 13 with M1 chip, which had a 256 GB SSD unit divided over two chips running in parallel. In the Blackmagic Disk Speed Test, the M2 MacBook Pro’s drive scraped together read and write speeds of 1,446 MB/s and 1,463 MB/s respectively. The M1 MacBook Pro’s SSD destroyed those marks, coming in 33.95% faster in write speed (2,215 MB/s) and a whopping 50.14% faster in read speed (2,900 MB/s). Yuryev’s results aren’t outliers either; even our slightly more reserved M1 MacBook Pro results still leave the M2 model hanging (see table below).

This apparent and deliberate flash storage chip reduction could also affect the 512 GB model of the M2 MacBook Pro 13, as the SSD performance as tested by zollotech also seems to struggle, producing a 2,080 MB/s read speed and 2,273 MB/s write speed in this instance. Fortunately, there are two NAND flash storage chips visible in our review of the 1 TB model of the Apple MacBook Pro 13 2022, although its benchmark results are hardly spectacular: 2,819 MB/s read speed and 3,036 MB/s write speed, with our review editor pointing out that Apple still relies on slower PCIe 3.0 drives, although laptops that come fitted with PCIe 4.0 SSDs out of the box are still pretty thin on the ground (Eurocom Sky Z7, Lenovo Legion 7i Gen 6, etc.).

It is important for those considering a purchase of the latest MacBook Pro 13 laptop from Apple to be aware of the considerable differences in storage speed that seems to be partly dependent on the amount of NAND chips installed. The Max Tech video shows two instances where the slower SSD meant the M2 MacBook Pro 13 from 2022 lagged behind the M1 MacBook Pro 13 from 2020, in the Logic Pro Music Production test and in a Photoshop photo-editing comparison. Both the new M2 variant and the older M1 version of the Apple MacBook Pro 13 laptop featured the same starting price of US$1,299.

Buy the 2020 Apple MacBook Pro 13 with M1 on Amazon