Intel Core i9 9900K vs Apple M4 (10-Core)

We compared two CPUs: the 3.6 GHz Intel Core i9 9900K (desktop) with 8-cores against the 4.46 GHz Apple M4 (10-Core) (laptop) with 10-cores. On this page, you'll find out which processor has better performance in benchmarks, games and other useful information.

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
Choose your main usage scenario to recalculate the Final Score and see which CPU suits your needs.
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Value for money (Beta)

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Key Differences

What are the key differences between (10-Core) and 9900K
Advantages of Intel Core i9 9900K
  • Supports up to 128 GB DDR4-2666 RAM
  • Unlocked multiplier
Advantages of Apple M4 (10-Core)
  • More powerful Apple M4 GPU (10-core) integrated graphics: 3.8 vs 0.5 TFLOPS
  • More modern manufacturing process โ€“ 3 versus 14 nanometers
  • Newer - released 5 years and 8 months later
  • Around 78.4 GB/s (188%) higher theoretical memory bandwidth
  • 2.3x faster in a single-core Geekbench v6 test - 3777 vs 1621 points
  • Has 2 more physical cores

Test in Benchmarks

Comparing the performance of CPUs across various tasks

Cinebench

Reputable cross-platform benchmark for high-performance processors
Cinebench 2024 (Single)
Cinebench 2024 (Multi)
Cinebench 2026 (Multi) - 3211
Cinebench Scores (#158th place)

GeekBench v6

The new version of this benchmark emulates common operations often used in real-world apps
Geekbench 6 (Single-Core)
M4 (10-Core) +133%
3777
Geekbench 6 (Multi-Core)
14818
File compression 545.7 MB/sec 1500 MB/sec
Clang compilation 67.7 Klines/sec 120.2 Klines/sec
HTML 5 Browser 175.1 pages/sec 329.3 pages/sec
PDF Renderer 275.6 Mpixels/sec 362.1 Mpixels/sec
Text processing 159 pages/sec 352.1 pages/sec
Background blur 40.4 images/sec 69.8 images/sec
Photo processing 68.6 images/sec 114.4 images/sec
Ray tracing 14.5 Mpixels/sec 18.1 Mpixels/sec
Sources: GeekBench [1], [2] โ€“ 610 samples

PassMark

Synthetic test that focuses on raw computational performance for low-level functions
Passmark CPU (Single-Core)
4499
Passmark CPU (Multi-Core)
23603
Integer math 66.1 GOps/sec 54.2 GOps/sec
Floating point math 41 GOps/sec 49.6 GOps/sec
Find prime numbers 46M Primes/sec 263M Primes/sec
Random string sorting 36.1M Strings/sec 34.3M Strings/sec
Data encryption 6.3 GBytes/sec 15.1 GBytes/sec
Data compression 282.6 MBytes/sec 280.5 MBytes/sec
Physics 929 Frames/sec 2527 Frames/sec
Extended instructions 19B Matrices/sec 13.6B Matrices/sec
Sources: PassMark [3], [4] โ€“ 17571 & 2752 samples

Blender

3D rendering test that measures CPU performance in 3D modeling tasks (uses all cores)
Blender CPU
178.22
229.85

Performance Per Watt

Shows the score you get per each watt of PL1 TDP
Cinebench 2024 / Watt 7.4 PPW 40.9 PPW
Geekbench 6 Multi / Watt 85.8 PPW 617.4 PPW
Passmark CPU Mark / Watt 190.1 PPW 983.5 PPW
Blender / Watt 1.88 PPW 9.58 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
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-01-01 (Mr Scare)Cinebench 202479 / 662
๐Ÿ“˜ 2025-08-09 (EndOfTheWorld77)Cinebench 202478 / 591
๐Ÿ“˜ 2024-03-28 (Gribbstar)Cinebench 202479 / 706
Apple M4 (10-Core)
DateBenchmarkResult
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-06-13 (doannguuyenmfs)Geekbench 6 CPU3703 / 15450
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-04-18 (Avacada)Geekbench 6 CPU3906 / 15577
๐Ÿ“˜ 2026-03-05 (Dovlet)Geekbench 6 CPU3916 / 15202
๐Ÿ“˜ 2025-12-31 (gmamorim)Geekbench 6 CPU3730 / 15258
๐Ÿ“˜ 2025-12-28 (LC)Cinebench 2024174 / 993

Specifications

Full technical specification of Intel Core i9 9900K and Apple M4 (10-Core)

General

Vendor Intel Apple
Released October 8, 2018 May 7, 2024
Type Desktop Laptop
Instruction Set x86-64 ARMv9
Codename Coffee Lake Apple M4
Model number i9-9900K APL1206
Integrated GPU UHD Graphics 630 Apple M4 GPU (10-core)
Rival Equivalent - AMD Ryzen 9 3900X - Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite (X1E-84-100)
Successor - Intel Core Ultra 9 285K - Apple M5 (10-Core)

CPU

Performance Cores
P-Cores 8 4
P-Threads 16 4
Base Frequency (P) 3.6 GHz 4.46 GHz
Turbo Boost Frequency (P) 5 GHz -
Efficient Cores
E-Cores - 6
E-Threads - 6
Base Frequency (E) - 2.89 GHz
Total
Total Cores 8 10
Total Threads 16 10
Bus Frequency 100 MHz 100 MHz
Multiplier 36x 44x
Bus Bandwidth 8 GT/s -
L1 Cache 64K (per core) 192K (per core)
L2 Cache 256K (per core) 16MB (shared)
L3 Cache 16MB (shared) -
Unlocked Multiplier Yes No

Package

Transistors - 28 billions
Fabrication Process 14 nm 3 nm
TDP (PL1) 95 W 24 W
Socket LGA-1151 Apple M-Socket
Peak Temperature 100ยฐC 100ยฐC
Die Size - 169.4 mmยฒ
Desktop CPU ranking (#145th place)

iGPU

Integrated Graphics Intel UHD Graphics 630 Apple M4 GPU (10-core)
GPU Base Clock 350 MHz 500 MHz
GPU Boost Clock 1200 MHz 1470 MHz
Shading Units 192 1280
TMUs 24 80
ROPs 3 40
Execution Units 24 160
TGP 15 W 18 W
iGPU FLOPS
0.5 TFLOPS
M4 (10-Core) +660%
3.8 TFLOPS

Memory Support

Memory Types - DDR4-2666 - LPDDR5X-7500
Max. Memory Size 128 GB 32 GB
Memory Channels 2 8
Max. Memory Bandwidth 41.6 GB/s 120 GB/s
ECC Support No No

Misc

Official Site Intel Core i9 9900K official page -
PCI Express Version 3.0 -
PCI Express Lanes 16 -
Further details
Notes on M4 (10-Core):
    - SoC is designed using ARMv9.4-A architecture.

Cast your vote

Choose between two processors
1 (11.1%)
8 (88.9%)
Total votes: 9

Comments

So which CPU will you choose: Apple M4 (10-Core) or Intel Core i9 9900K?
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