When Apple unveiled the iPhone 16 sequence in early September, the corporate launched the A18 Professional chip as “the quickest CPU in any smartphone.” The A18 chip that powers the non-Professional iPhone 16 fashions must be nearly as quick.
However I knew going into the Glowtime occasion that I’d not purchase an iPhone 16 Professional this 12 months. As an alternative, I selected the iPhone 16 Plus, with the A18 Professional’s chip being the least of my worries. I wished a bigger display screen, higher battery life, Apple Intelligence, and the Digicam Management button.
I took the iPhone 16 efficiency with no consideration, trusting the A18 could be an amazing improve from the iPhone 14 Professional’s A16 Bionic. It might be an improve that I wouldn’t discover in terms of pace. As an alternative, I counted on it to ship quick AI and improved power effectivity.
A number of weeks later, I don’t have Apple Intelligence as a result of it’s not out but, and Europe must wait even longer. Nonetheless, the iPhone 16 Plus battery is pretty much as good as I had hoped.
Additionally, we lastly have a pace take a look at involving the iPhone 16 Professional Max and Galaxy S24 Extremely to find out which telephone is the quickest. The outcomes are extremely predictable for the present state of the cellular business.
The iPhone 16 Professional Max benchmarks show that Apple is true to label the A18 Professional chip because the quickest within the business. The Galaxy S24 Extremely can’t match it, and neither can every other 2024 Android flagship. However as I hold telling you, benchmarks gained’t inform you the total story.
The Galaxy S24 Extremely won’t carry out as effectively in these benchmarks, however you gained’t understand it’s slower in actual life than the iPhone 16 Professional Max, if that’s even the case. You’d have to make use of each gadgets to see the variations, if any.
Additionally, a very powerful factor to recollect is that almost all smartphone customers gained’t want that high efficiency. I rely myself in that group. I don’t play graphic-intensive video games, nor do I would like the highest processing energy that the A18 Professional can ship. Put in a different way, I may have simply stored utilizing the iPhone 14 Professional with out skipping a beat.
This brings me to certainly one of my favourite pace assessments for brand new smartphones, the one which PhoneBuffs runs for all-new flagship releases. The latest model of the comparability entails The iPhone 16 Professional Max and the Galaxy S24 Extremely.
As I mentioned earlier than, the outcomes are predictable. What I meant by that’s that the iPhone would certainly win. However it’ll solely “win” by a really small margin, contemplating how extremely quick mid-range and flagship telephones have develop into—so small that it doesn’t even matter.
As you may see within the screenshot above, the iPhone 16 Professional Max and Galaxy S24 Extremely completed the primary spherical nearly concurrently. Within the second spherical, the iPhone beat the Galaxy telephone by a few seconds.
The outcomes mimic the iPhone 15 Professional Max vs. Galaxy S24 Extremely pace take a look at from earlier this 12 months, however they’re even nearer. The Galaxy S24 Extremely has benefited from software program optimizations since its launch, so the efficiency increase is comprehensible.
What do these rounds imply, and the way do they replicate real-life use? Properly, the primary lap consists of every telephone opening the identical suite of apps for the primary time. Some apps are easy apps that don’t require numerous processing. Others are extra taxing for the CPU, and the checklist consists of video games.
The primary spherical is the one which issues, and the iPhone nearly all the time wins this spherical. The iPhone 16 Professional Max did it, too, however the margin is within the milliseconds.
The second lap consists of opening the identical apps from RAM. The iPhone 16 Professional Max has 8GB of RAM, whereas the Galaxy S24 Extremely options 12GB. The iPhone wins by lower than two seconds right here, exhibiting that iOS 18 is extra optimized than Android 14. It may get barely higher.
What PhoneBuff does with these assessments is to copy real-life use. We open apps on a regular basis and transfer from one app to the subsequent. Some keep in reminiscence, others don’t. That’s the pace we care about, with the ability to get shortly from one app to the subsequent and have the smartphone do no matter we’d like it to do.
The pace take a look at exhibits you wouldn’t be mistaken to purchase both system when you want a quick flagship and don’t care in regards to the working system. That mentioned, the Galaxy S24 Extremely’s successor is a few three months away. That mannequin will characteristic a barely quicker chip, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 4.
