Apple M2
The Apple M2 is an ARM-based system on a chip (SoC) designed by Apple Inc. as a central processing unit (CPU) and graphics processing unit (GPU) for its Mac laptops and the iPad Pro tablets. It is the second generation of ARM architecture intended for Apple’s Mac computers after switching from Intel Core, succeeding the Apple M1. Apple announced the M2 on June 6, 2022, at WWDC, along with models of the MacBook Air and the 13-inch MacBook Pro using the M2. It was released on June 24, 2022. The M2 is made with TSMC’s “Enhanced 5-nanometer technology” N5P process and contains 20 billion transistors, a 25% increase from the M1. Apple claims CPU improvements up to 18% and GPU improvements up to 35% compared to the M1.[1]
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| Designed by | Apple Inc. |
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| Common manufacturer(s) | |
| Min. feature size | 5 nm (N5P) |
| Instruction set | ARMv8.5-A[citation needed] |
| Microarchitecture | "Avalanche" and "Blizzard" |
| Cores | 8 (4× high-performance + 4× high-efficiency) |
| L1 cache | 192+128 KB per core (performance cores) 128+64 KB per core (efficient cores) |
| L2 cache | 16 MB (performance cores) 4 MB (efficient cores) |
| Created | June 24, 2022 |
| Transistors | 20 billion |
| Last level cache | 8 MB |
| Predecessor | Apple M1 |
| GPU | Apple-designed integrated graphics 8 or 10 core GPU |
| Application | Notebook (MacBook family), Tablet (iPad Pro) |
| Variant | Apple A15 |
Search Apple M2 on Amazon.
| Mac transition to Apple silicon |
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The Apple M2 is an ARM-based system on a chip (SoC) designed by Apple Inc. as a central processing unit (CPU) and graphics processing unit (GPU) for its Mac notebooks and the iPad Pro tablet. It is the second generation of ARM architecture intended for Apple’s Mac computers after switching from Intel Core to Apple silicon, succeeding the M1. Apple announced the M2 on June 6, 2022, at WWDC, along with models of the MacBook Air and the 13-inch MacBook Pro using the M2. It was released on June 24, 2022. The M2 is made with TSMC’s "Enhanced 5-nanometer technology" N5P process and contains 20 billion transistors, a 25% increase from the M1. Apple claims CPU improvements up to 18% and GPU improvements up to 35% compared to the M1.[1]
Design
CPU
The M2 has four high-performance "Avalanche" and four energy-efficient "Blizzard" cores, first seen in the A15 Bionic, providing a hybrid configuration similar to ARM DynamIQ and Intel’s Alder Lake and Raptor Lake processors. The high-performance cores have an unusually large 192 KB of L1 instruction cache and 128 KB of L1 data cache and share a 16 MB L2 cache;[2] the energy-efficient cores have a 128 KB L1 instruction cache, 64 KB L1 data cache, and a shared 4 MB L2 cache. It also has an 8 MB system level cache shared by the GPU.
GPU
The M2 integrates an Apple designed ten-core (or eight-core) graphics processing unit (GPU). Each GPU core is split into 32 execution units, which each contain eight arithmetic logic units (ALUs). In total, the M2 GPU contains up to 320 execution units or 2,560 ALUs, which have a maximum floating point (FP32) performance of 3.6 TFLOPs.
Memory
The M2 uses 6,400 MT/s LPDDR5 SDRAM in a unified memory configuration shared by all the components of the processor. The SoC and RAM chips are mounted together in a system-in-a-package design. 8 GB, 16 GB and 24 GB configurations are available. It has a 128-bit memory bus with 100 GB/s bandwidth.
Other features
The M2 contains dedicated neural network hardware in a 16-core Neural Engine, capable of executing 15.8 trillion operations per second. Other components include an image signal processor, a PCIe storage controller, a USB4 controller that includes Thunderbolt 3 support, and a Secure Enclave.
Supported codecs on the M2 include 8K H.264, 8K H.265 (8/10bit, up to 4:4:4), 8K Apple ProRes, VP9, and JPEG.
Performance and efficiency
The M2 features faster performance cores and a larger cache than its predecessor, while the efficiency cores have been improved for greater performance gains than its predecessor.[1]
Compared to the CPU of the Intel Core i7-1255U, the M2’s CPU delivers nearly twice the performance at the same power consumption level. It delivers the peak performance with a quarter of its power consumption level.[1][note 1]
Compared to the CPU of the Intel Core i7-1260P, the M2’s CPU delivers nearly 90 percent of the peak performance with a quarter of its power consumption level.[1][note 2]
Compared to the GPU in the Intel Core i7-1255U, the M2’s GPU delivers 2.3 times faster performance at the same power consumption level and matches its peak performance with a fifth of its power consumption level.[1][note 3]
Products that use the Apple M2 series
M2
- MacBook Air (M2, 2022)
- MacBook Pro (13-inch, M2, 2022)
- iPad Pro (11-inch, 4th generation) (2022)
- iPad Pro (12.9-inch, 6th generation) (2022)
See also
Notes
- ↑ Testing conducted by Apple in May 2022 using preproduction 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M2, 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU, and 16GB of RAM. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. 10-core PC laptop chip performance data from testing Samsung Galaxy Book2 360 (NP730QED-KA1US) with Core i7-1255U and 16GB of RAM. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.[1]
- ↑ Testing conducted by Apple in May 2022 using preproduction 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M2, 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU, and 16GB of RAM. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. 12-core PC laptop chip performance data from testing MSI Prestige 14Evo (A12M-011) with Core i7-1260P and 16GB of RAM. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.[1]
- ↑ Testing conducted by Apple in May 2022 using preproduction 13-inch MacBook Pro systems with Apple M2, 8-core CPU, 10-core GPU, and 16GB of RAM. Performance measured using select industry‑standard benchmarks. 10-core PC laptop chip performance data from testing Samsung Galaxy Book2 360 (NP730QED-KA1US) with Core i7-1255U and 16GB of RAM. Performance tests are conducted using specific computer systems and reflect the approximate performance of MacBook Pro.[1]
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