On Tuesday Apple updated its MacBook Pro lineup. Geekbench 3 results for most of the new models have already appeared in the Geekbench Browser which lets us see how performance has improved across the lineup.
For the 15-inch MacBook Pro, processor speeds were increased by 200 MHz, leading to a 6% to 9% increase in performance:
| Processor | 2013 | 2014 |
|---|---|---|
| Good | Core i7-4750HQ @ 2.0 GHz | Core i7-4770HQ @ 2.2 GHz |
| Better | Core i7-4850HQ @ 2.3 GHz | Core i7-4870HQ @ 2.5 GHz |
| Best | Core i7-4960HQ @ 2.6 GHz | Core i7-4980HQ @ 2.8 GHz |
For the 13-inch MacBook Pro, processor speeds were also increased by 200 MHz, leading to a 7% to 8% increase in performance (note that we do not yet have results for the new high-end model):
| Processor | 2013 | 2014 |
|---|---|---|
| Good | Core i5-4258U @ 2.4 GHz | Core i5-4278U @ 2.6 GHz |
| Better | Core i5-4288U @ 2.6 GHz | Core i5-4308U @ 2.8 GHz |
| Best | Core i7-4558U @ 2.8 GHz | Core i7-4578U @ 3.0 GHz |
Overall performance improvements for the new MacBook Pros are modest and unsurprising. Both the 2013 and the 2014 models use Haswell processors, so all of the performance gains come from the increased clock speeds. We will have to wait for the new Broadwell processors (currently scheduled for mid-2015) to see more signficant improvements in MacBook Pro performance.