Apple M4 Pro 20-Core GPU vs NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070 vs Apple M4 Max 40-Core GPU

Apple M4 Pro 20-Core GPU

The Apple M4 Pro GPU (20 cores) is an integrated graphics adapter designed by Apple that's built into the 14-core Apple M4 Pro SoC. It features 20 "cores" and has access to at least 24 GB of fast 273 GB/s LPDDR5x on-package RAM depending on the configuration. As is typical for graphics adapters released in 2024, it has hardware support for ray tracing as well as mesh shading and other modern technologies. It also supports external displays with resolutions as high as "8K" and it can HW-decode a few popular video codecs such as h.264, h.265 and AV1.

Performance

Its gaming performance is at least as good as that of the GTX 1660 Ti Laptop. Please keep in mind that very few games have been compiled specifically for Apple silicon Macs meaning most titles have to be run via emulation layers. Some of them are displayed with visual artefacts as a result, or don't start at all.

• The Witcher 3 1080p Ultra = 53 fps (close to the GTX 1660 Ti Laptop)
• Baldur's Gate 3 1440p Ultra = 42 fps (close to the GeForce RTX 4050 Laptop)
• Cyberpunk 2077 2.1 Phantom Liberty 1080p Ultra = 40 fps (close to the GTX 1660 Ti Laptop)

In synthetic benchmarks, the iGPU is about 30% faster than the old M3 Pro GPU and is even on par with a fast GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU (3DMark Wild Life Extreme Unlimited).

Power consumption

When under heavy CPU and GPU load, the iGPU portion of the 14-core M4 Pro consumes about 32 W according to monitoring software "powermetrics". With no load, it makes do with as little as 1 W to 3 W.

Just like the rest of the Apple M4 Pro chip, the integrated graphics adapter is manufactured on a "second generation 3 nm" TSMC process which is still cutting-edge as of late 2024.

NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4070

The Nvidia GeForce RTX 4070 is a high-end desktop graphics card based on the AD104 chip using the Ada Lovelace architecture. The 4070 offers 5,888 cores and 12 GB GDDR6X graphics memory with a 192 bit memory bus and clocked at 21 Gbits. The card offers a good raytracing performance thanks to the 46 dedicated raytracing cores. For AI calculations (and DLSS 3 in games), the RTX 4070 has 184 Tensor cores.

The gaming performance is well suited for 2k/QHD gaming in most demanding games, and should be able to handle 4k gaming for lesser demanding games (or with reduced settings / DLSS activated). The raw gaming performance is comparable to an older RTX 3080 or a AMD Radeon 6800 XT. Compared to the similar named mobile GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop GPU, the desktop variant is much faster.

The AD104 chip is manufactured in the modern 5nm process at TSMC (4N with EUV) and specified with a TGP (Total Graphics Power) of 200 Watt (compared to the 450 Watt of the RTX 4090).

Apple M4 Max 40-Core GPU

The Apple M4 Max GPU (40 cores) is an integrated graphics adapter that's built into the 16-core Apple M4 Max SoC. It features 40 "cores" and has access to at least 48 GB of fast 546 GB/s LPDDR5x on-package RAM depending on the configuration. As is typical for graphics adapters released in 2024, it has hardware support for ray tracing as well as mesh shading and other modern technologies. It also supports external displays with resolutions as high as "8K" and can HW-decode a few popular video codecs such as h.264, h.265 and AV1.

Performance

Its gaming performance is set to be approximately as good as that of the GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop. Please keep in mind that very few games have been compiled specifically for Apple silicon Macs meaning most titles have to be run via emulation layers. Some of them are displayed with visual artefacts as a result, or don't start at all.

Power consumption

Given the power on offer, we expect the iGPU to consume over 45 W when under heavy loads.

Just like the rest of the Apple M4 Max chip, the integrated graphics adapter is manufactured on a "second generation 3 nm" TSMC process which is still cutting-edge as of late 2024.