A Geekbench score for the iPhone 14 Pro Max with the new A16 Bionic chip has revealed little performance improvement compared to the iPhone 13 Pro and Pro Max from last year.
A Geekbench test result for iPhone15,3, the identifier for the iPhone 14 Pro Max, shows the new iPhone with a single-core score of 1879 and a multi-core score of 4664. The iPhone 13 Pro scores 1707 in single-core and 4659 in multi-core, only being marginally slower than the latest high-end iPhone.
The most significant new feature of the A16 Bionic chip is that it's the first chip from Apple based on the smaller 4nm process. The A15 Bionic chip, like Apple's M1 and M2 Apple silicon chips for the Mac, is based on the 5nm process.
Despite the smaller jump in performance that some may have hoped, Apple says the A16 Bionic chip is "the fastest chip ever in a smartphone." The A16 Bionic has a more powerful GPU that can provide up to 50% more memory bandwidth for graphics-intensive games. The A16 Bionic also has a new 16-core Neural Engine to power advanced machine learning tasks. In the CPU, the A16 Bionic features the same 6-core count as the A15 Bionic, but Apple says it's a "new 6-core CPU."
Update: This article has been updated to note that the Geekbench result is for an iPhone 14 Pro Max, not an iPhone 14 Pro. Both devices use the same A16 chip, however, so their scores should be similar.
Thursday December 11, 2025 8:49 am PST by Joe Rossignol
Apple seeded the second iOS 26.2 Release Candidate to developers earlier this week, meaning the update will be released to the general public very soon.
Apple confirmed iOS 26.2 would be released in December, but it did not provide a specific date. We expect the update to be released by early next week.
iOS 26.2 includes a handful of new features and changes on the iPhone, such as a new...
Wednesday December 10, 2025 2:52 am PST by Tim Hardwick
Google Maps on iOS quietly gained a new feature recently that automatically recognizes where you've parked your vehicle and saves the location for you.
Announced on LinkedIn by Rio Akasaka, Google Maps' senior product manager, the new feature auto-detects your parked location even if you don't use the parking pin function, saves it for up to 48 hours, and then automatically removes it once...
Apple has ordered 22 million OLED panels from Samsung Display for the first foldable iPhone, signaling a significantly larger production target than the display industry had previously anticipated, ET News reports.
In the now-seemingly deleted report, ET News claimed that Samsung plans to mass-produce 11 million inward-folding OLED displays for Apple next year, as well as 11 million...
Friday December 5, 2025 9:40 am PST by Tim Hardwick
Apple is about to release iOS 26.2, the second major point update for iPhones since iOS 26 was rolled out in September, and there are at least 15 notable changes and improvements worth checking out. We've rounded them up below.
Apple is expected to roll out iOS 26.2 to compatible devices sometime between December 8 and December 16. When the update drops, you can check Apple's servers for the ...
Thursday December 11, 2025 11:28 am PST by Juli Clover
Apple today released new firmware designed for the AirPods Pro 3 and the prior-generation AirPods Pro 2. The AirPods Pro 3 firmware is 8B30, up from 8B25, while the AirPods Pro 2 firmware is 8B28, up from 8B21.
There's no word on what's include in the updated firmware, but the AirPods Pro 2 and AirPods Pro 3 are getting expanded support for Live Translation in the European Union in iOS...
Monday December 8, 2025 10:18 am PST by Juli Clover
Apple today seeded the second release candidate version of iOS 26.2 to developers and public beta testers, with the software coming one week after Apple seeded the first RC. The release candidate represents the final version iOS 26.2 that will be provided to the public if no further bugs are found.
Registered developers and public beta testers can download the betas from the Settings app on...
Thursday December 11, 2025 10:31 am PST by Juli Clover
The AirTag 2 will include a handful of new features that will improve tracking capabilities, according to a new report from Macworld. The site says that it was able to access an internal build of iOS 26, which includes references to multiple unreleased products.
Here's what's supposedly coming:
An improved pairing process, though no details were provided. AirTag pairing is already...
Monday December 8, 2025 4:54 am PST by Tim Hardwick
Apple is actively testing under-screen Face ID for next year's iPhone 18 Pro models using a special "spliced micro-transparent glass" window built into the display, claims a Chinese leaker.
According to "Smart Pikachu," a Weibo account that has previously shared accurate supply-chain details on Chinese Android hardware, Apple is testing the special glass as a way to let the TrueDepth...
Wednesday December 10, 2025 12:22 pm PST by Juli Clover
The next-generation low-cost iPad will use Apple's A19 chip, according to a report from Macworld. Macworld claims to have seen an "internal Apple code document" with information about the 2026 iPad lineup.
Prior documentation discovered by MacRumors suggested that the iPad 12 would be equipped with an A18 chip, not an A19 chip. The A19 chip was just released this year in the iPhone 17, and...
Thursday December 11, 2025 4:19 am PST by Tim Hardwick
Apple's next-generation Studio Display is expected to arrive early next year, and a new report allegedly provides a couple more details on the external monitor's capabilities.
According to internal Apple code seen by Macworld, the new external display will feature a variable refresh rate capable of up to 120Hz – aka ProMotion – as well as support for HDR content. The current Studio...
They improved most in power efficiency, which I’d actually prefer at this point. Let’s be honest, even an Iphone XS doesn’t feel sluggish. When’s the last time you used an iPhone that did??
More important than always squeezing more horsepower out of the chip is also the battery life - and that’s again increased. I don’t think any other phone lasts this long and has this much horse power at the same time.
Looks like Moores Law is already catching up with Apple Silicon. But here I am on a plane using an iPhone X with an A11 chip. Who am I to complain really. These phones are so super fast that you get one, it’s gonna last you years. I am still using a 6s at home with a A9 as a backup phone. Apart from the sucky battery life, it’s still super fast.
But I think the SoC has reached a point now for Apple where it’s pretty much a solved problem. The issue is unleashing the existing power of what’s already on the market. So software and efficiency is really where it’s at.
Besides 5nm to 4nm, shouldn’t be that surprised. If A17 Bionic goes to 3 NM, might see some dramatic raw performance. But again, who is Apple competing with here? It’s certainly not Android phones, it’s obviously itself.
That's a 10% jump in single-core performance - the metric that is going to make the most difference in day to day usage of the phone. I'll take a quiet multi-core year if we get major energy consumption and heat-output reductions as a result. Also, we know when it comes to the M3, multi-core performance scales almost linearly by just packing in more cores, so I'm not concerned for Apple Silicon on the Mac.
