Home > CPU Comparison > Core i9 9900K or M2 Pro: what's better?

Intel Core i9 9900K vs Apple M2 Pro

41 out of 100
Intel Core i9 9900K
VS
62 out of 100
Apple M2 Pro
Intel Core i9 9900K
Apple M2 Pro

We compared two CPUs: the 3.6 GHz Intel Core i9 9900K (desktop) with 8-cores against the 3.5 GHz Apple M2 Pro (laptop) with 12-cores. On this page, you'll find out which processor has better performance in benchmarks, games and other useful information.

  1. Review
  2. Differences
  3. Performance
  4. Specs
  5. Comments

Review

General overview and comparison of the processors
Single-Core Performance
Performance in single-threaded apps and benchmarks
Multi-Core Performance
Measure performance when all cores are involved
Power Efficiency
The efficiency score of power consumption
Integrated Graphics
iGPU capabilities for gaming and 3D-intensive tasks
The "iGPU" and "Power Efficiency" have a minor impact on the DeviceFacts Score for desktop CPU.
DeviceFacts Final Score
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Value for money (Beta)

Global average CPU prices are used by default! For better accuracy, enter your current prices and click “Calculate".
Currency
VS

Key Differences

What are the key differences between Pro and 9900K
Advantages of Intel Core i9 9900K
  • Supports up to 128 GB DDR4-2666 RAM
  • Unlocked multiplier
Advantages of Apple M2 Pro
  • More powerful Apple M2 Pro GPU (19-core) integrated graphics: 6.8 vs 0.5 TFLOPS
  • Around 163.2 GB/s (392%) higher theoretical memory bandwidth
  • More modern manufacturing process – 5 versus 14 nanometers
  • Newer - released 4 years and 4 months later
  • Supports quad-channel memory
  • 64% faster in a single-core Geekbench v6 test - 2666 vs 1621 points
  • Has 4 more physical cores
  • Newer PCI Express version – 4.0

Test in Benchmarks

Comparing the performance of CPUs across various tasks
CPU:
Core i9 9900K
vs
M2 Pro

Cinebench

Reputable cross-platform benchmark for high-performance processors
Cinebench 2024 (Single)
Core i9 9900K
79
M2 Pro +58%
125
Cinebench 2024 (Multi)
Core i9 9900K
706
M2 Pro +13%
795
Submit your benchmark results

GeekBench v6

The new version of this benchmark emulates common operations often used in real-world apps
Geekbench 6 (Single-Core)
Core i9 9900K
1621
M2 Pro +64%
2666
Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)
Core i9 9900K
8151
M2 Pro +78%
14489
File compression 545.7 MB/sec 1630 MB/sec
Clang compilation 67.7 Klines/sec 125.3 Klines/sec
HTML 5 Browser 175.1 pages/sec 356.9 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 275.6 Mpixels/sec 352.9 Mpixels/sec
Text processing 159 pages/sec 266.9 pages/sec
Background blur 40.4 images/sec 53.8 images/sec
Photo processing 68.6 images/sec 126.3 images/sec
Ray tracing 14.5 Mpixels/sec 17 Mpixels/sec
Sources: GeekBench [1], [2] – 610 & 917 samples

PassMark

Synthetic test that focuses on raw computational performance for low-level functions
Passmark CPU (Single-Core)
Core i9 9900K
2911
M2 Pro +40%
4089
Passmark CPU (Multi-Core)
Core i9 9900K
18059
M2 Pro +48%
26724
Integer math 66.1 GOps/sec 57.6 GOps/sec
Floating point math 41 GOps/sec 73.2 GOps/sec
Find prime numbers 46M Primes/sec 354M Primes/sec
Random string sorting 36.1M Strings/sec 40.9M Strings/sec
Data encryption 6.3 GBytes/sec 15.6 GBytes/sec
Data compression 282.6 MBytes/sec 334.8 MBytes/sec
Physics 929 Frames/sec 3611 Frames/sec
Extended instructions 19B Matrices/sec 14.7B Matrices/sec
Sources: PassMark [3], [4] – 17571 & 584 samples

Blender

3D rendering test that measures CPU performance in 3D modeling tasks (uses all cores)
Blender CPU
Core i9 9900K
178.22
M2 Pro +11%
198.23

Performance Per Watt

Shows the score you get per each watt of PL1 TDP
Cinebench 2024 / Watt 7.4 PPW 26.5 PPW
Geekbench 6 Multi / Watt 85.8 PPW 483 PPW
Passmark CPU Mark / Watt 190.1 PPW 890.8 PPW
Blender / Watt 1.88 PPW 6.61 PPW
These are rough calculations, as most CPUs surpass PL1 TDP wattage even in multicore workloads.

Recent User Tests

The latest benchmark tests that have been submitted by users
Intel Core i9 9900K
DateBenchmarkResult
📘 2026-01-01 (Mr Scare)Cinebench 202479 / 662
📘 2025-08-09 (EndOfTheWorld77)Cinebench 202478 / 591
📘 2024-03-28 (Gribbstar)Cinebench 202479 / 706
Add View all (3)
Apple M2 Pro
DateBenchmarkResult
📘 2025-04-23 (Roman)Cinebench 2024125 / 795
Add View all (1)

Specifications

Full technical specification of Intel Core i9 9900K and Apple M2 Pro

General

Vendor Intel Apple
Released October 8, 2018 January 17, 2023
Type Desktop Laptop
Instruction Set x86-64 ARMv8
Codename Coffee Lake Apple M2
Model number i9-9900K -
Integrated GPU UHD Graphics 630 Apple M2 Pro GPU (19-core)
Rival Equivalent - AMD Ryzen 9 3900X -
Successor - Intel Core Ultra 9 285K - Apple M5 Pro (18-Core)

CPU

Performance Cores
P-Cores 8 8
P-Threads 16 8
Base Frequency (P) 3.6 GHz 3.5 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (P) 5 GHz -
Efficient Cores
E-Cores - 4
E-Threads - 4
Base Frequency (E) - 2.4 GHz
Total
Total Cores 8 12
Total Threads 16 12
Bus Frequency 100 MHz -
Multiplier 36x -
Bus Bandwidth 8 GT/s -
L1 Cache 64K (per core) 192K (per core)
L2 Cache 256K (per core) 32MB (shared)
L3 Cache 16MB (shared) -
Unlocked Multiplier Yes No

Package

Transistors - 40 billions
Fabrication Process 14 nm 5 nm
TDP (PL1) 95 W 30 W
Socket LGA-1151 Apple M-Socket
Peak Temperature 100°C 100°C
Desktop CPU ranking (#145th place)

iGPU

Integrated Graphics Intel UHD Graphics 630 Apple M2 Pro GPU (19-core)
GPU Base Clock 350 MHz 450 MHz
GPU Boost Clock 1200 MHz 1398 MHz
Shading Units 192 2432
TMUs 24 152
ROPs 3 76
Execution Units 24 304
TGP 15 W 35 W
iGPU FLOPS
Core i9 9900K
0.5 TFLOPS
M2 Pro +1260%
6.8 TFLOPS
More info: Apple M2 Pro GPU (19-core) compared to UHD Graphics 630

Memory Support

Memory Types - DDR4-2666 - LPDDR5-6400
Max. Memory Size 128 GB 32 GB
Memory Channels 2 4
Max. Memory Bandwidth 41.6 GB/s 204.8 GB/s
ECC Support No No

Misc

Official Site Intel Core i9 9900K official page -
PCI Express Version 3.0 4.0
PCI Express Lanes 16 -

Cast your vote

Choose between two processors
2 (28.6%)
5 (71.4%)
Total votes: 7

Competitors

1. Intel Core i9 9900K vs AMD Ryzen 9 9950X
2. Intel Core i9 9900K vs Apple M3
3. Intel Core i9 9900K vs Apple M1 (1)
4. Intel Core i9 9900K vs Intel Core i9 14900K
5. Intel Core i9 9900K vs AMD Ryzen 7 7800X3D
6. Apple M2 Pro vs Apple M1 Pro (1)
7. Apple M2 Pro vs Apple M3
8. Apple M2 Pro vs Apple M4 Pro (14-Core) (2)
9. Apple M2 Pro vs Apple M1 Max
10. Apple M2 Pro vs Apple M4 (10-Core)
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Comments

So which CPU will you choose: Apple M2 Pro or Intel Core i9 9900K?
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