GeForce RTX 4090 vs Apple M1 Ultra GPU (64-core)

We performed a head-to-head comparison of the GeForce RTX 4090 24 GB with 128 pipelines and 16384 shaders against the 6 months older Apple M1 Ultra GPU (64-core) that utilizes 1024 pipelines and 8192 shaders. Here you will find complete details about specs, efficiency, performance tests, and more.

Review

General comparison of performance in games, applications, power efficiency, and other metrics
Gaming
Performance in DirectX, OpenCL, and Vulkan games
Workstation
Perf. in 3D modeling, video editing and rendering apps
AI/ML
Capabilities for machine learning and AI-related tasks
Energy Efficiency
Power consumption efficiency in different scenarios
DeviceFacts Final Score
Overall video card score
The "Energy Efficiency" metric has less impact on the DeviceFacts Score for desktop GPU.

Key differences

Key distinctions and advantages of M1 Ultra GPU (64-core) over RTX 4090
Reasons to consider the GeForce RTX 4090
  • Performs significantly better (up to 3.9x) in 3DMark Steel Nomad Lite
  • 3.9x higher maximum theoretical performance (82.6 vs 21.2 TFLOPS)
  • Supports Nvidia DLSS 3 technology
  • Achieves 3x more points in the GeekBench 6 Compute test (316K vs 106K)
  • Has 23% higher memory bandwidth: 1010 vs 819.2 GB/s
  • Has 2x more shading units (16384 vs 8192)

Gaming Performance

Frame rate comparison across popular AAA titles at different resolutions

Games

FPS Table
Forza Horizon 5
275
199
193
155
-
The Witcher 3
292
268
191
101
-
Counter-Strike 2
339
238
188
90
-
Far Cry 6
203
179
170
104
-
Hogwarts Legacy
200
163
132
74
-
CoD: Modern Warfare III
266
263
219
151
-
Ghost of Tsushima
188
152
137
91
-
Cyberpunk 2077
226
208
143
66
-
Shadow of the Tomb Raider
302
284
222
118
-
Average FPS by Resolution
1080p High 255 -
1080p Ultra 217 -
1440p Ultra 177 -
4K Ultra 106 -
Margin of Error Low High

Benchmarks

Graphics cards’ performance in recent benchmarking apps

3D Mark

Multiplatform graphics benchmark suite that directly correlates with performance in modern games
Steel Nomad Lite Score
RTX 4090 +293%
42169
Time Spy 36299 -
Solar Bay 187525 36712
Port Royal 26127 -
Fire Strike 72432 -
Wild Life Extreme 85218 29343
Night Raid 195813 -
Sources: 3DMark [1], [2]

GeekBench 6 OpenCL

GPU test for computational tasks (image processing, photography, computer vision, and ML)
GB6 Compute Score
RTX 4090 +197%
316301
Background Blur 318.9 img/sec 157.3 img/sec
Face Detection 222.8 img/sec 108.7 img/sec
Horizon Detection 14.2 Gpixels/sec 5.07 Gpixels/sec
Edge Detection 21 Gpixels/sec 10.7 Gpixels/sec
Gaussian Blur 23.9 Gpixels/sec 6.59 Gpixels/sec
Feature Matching 2.38 Gpixels/sec 0.73 Gpixels/sec
Stereo Matching 1950 Gpixels/sec 293.4 Gpixels/sec
Particle Physics 48090.4 FPS 14154.4 FPS
API OpenCL OpenCL
Sources: Geekbench [3], [4]

Cinebench 2024 GPU

Hardware benchmark using Maxon's Cinema 4D rendering engine
Cinebench 2024 GPU
RTX 4090 +878%
32578

Passmark Graphics

Videocard test that focuses on compute shaders, multi-texturing, tessellation, and other features
G3D Mark Score
G2D Mark 1303 -
DirectX 11 323 FPS -
DirectX 12 151 FPS -
GPU Compute 25991 Ops/s -
Sources: PassMark [5] – 22563 samples

Blender

Rendering performance test for 3D modeling
Blender GPU
RTX 4090 +609%
11681.51
Sources: Blender [9], [10] – 8966 & 70 samples

Recent User Tests

The latest benchmark tests that have been submitted by users
GeForce RTX 4090
DateBenchmarkResult
📘 2026-10-06 (Devansh)Geekbench 6 OpenCL394674
📘 2026-10-06 (Devansh)Geekbench 7 OpenCL338129
📘 2026-04-03 (afroman420IU)Cinebench 202432578
Apple M1 Ultra GPU (64-core)
No benchmark results yet

Artificial Intelligence Tests

Performance in machine learning and artificial intelligence tasks

GeekBench 6 ML

Tests throughput of AI operations in single, half, and quantized precision
GB6 ML Single Precision
RTX 4090 +227%
42962
GB6 ML Half Precision
RTX 4090 +323%
59636
GB6 ML Quantized
RTX 4090 +139%
31670
Image Classification (SP) 15600 4834
Image Segmentation (HP) 36657 14458
Image Super Resolution (Q) 48114 13757
Face Detection (HP) 78111 23618
Pose Estimation (Q) 289639 80481
Text Classification (SP) 4074 2265
Machine Translation (HP) 6349 1798
Object Detection (SP) 21186 4975
Depth Estimation (Q) 75599 25755
Style Transfer (SP) 601428 135609
Framework ONNX Core ML
Backend DirectML GPU
Sources: Geekbench [9], [10]
Results were compared using different ML frameworks

Specifications

Technical specifications of GeForce RTX 4090 and Apple M1 Ultra GPU (64-core)

General

Vendor Nvidia Apple
Build Discrete Integrated
Released September 20, 2022 March 8, 2022
Launch price (MSRP) $1599 -
Case Desktop Laptop
Purpose Gaming Professional
Segment High-end High-end
Architecture Ada Lovelace Apple M GPU
GPU Codename AD102 Custom
Rival Equivalent - - GeForce RTX 4070 Laptop
Successor - GeForce RTX 5090 -
Recommended CPU - Intel Core i9 14900K or above - Apple M1 Ultra or above
Used in CPUs - - Apple M1 Ultra
Desktop GPU rating (#3rd place)
Laptop GPU ranking (#32nd place)

Graphics Processing Unit

Base Clock 2235 MHz 450 MHz
Boost Clock 2520 MHz 1296 MHz
Shading Units 16384 8192
Texture Mapping Units (TMUs) 512 512
Render Output Units (ROPs) 176 256
Compute Units (Pipelines) 128 1024
Tensor Cores 512 -
Ray-tracing Cores 128 -
L1 Cache 128KB per cluster -
L2 Cache 72MB shared -
Instructions Per Cycle 2 IPC 2 IPC

Raw Performance

Pixel Fill Rate 444 GPixel/s 332 GPixel/s
Texture Fill Rate 1290 GTexel/s 664 GTexel/s
FLOPS (FP32)
RTX 4090 +290%
82.6 TFLOPS

Physical

Interface PCIe 4.0 x16 Custom
TGP 450 W 120 W
Manufacturing TSMC TSMC
Fabrication Process 5 nm 5 nm
Die Size 609 mm² -
Transistor Count 76.3 billion 92.8 billion
Transistor Density 125.29 MTr/mm² -
Max. Temperature - 94°C

Memory

Memory Type GDDR6X System Shared
Memory Size 24 GB -
Memory Clock 2625 MHz 6400 MHz
Effective Memory Speed 21000 Mbps 12800 Mbps
Bus 384-bit 1024-bit
ECC No No
Memory Bandwidth
RTX 4090 +23%
1010 GB/s

API

DirectX 12 -
Vulkan 1.3 -
OpenGL 4.6 -
OpenCL 3.0 -
CUDA 8.9 -
Ray Tracing Yes No
DLSS DLSS 3 No
DisplayPort 1.4a -

Cast your vote

Choose between two graphics cards
16 (94.1%)
1 (5.9%)
Total votes: 17

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