M5 MacBook Pro 14 review: The GPU performance boost is real

8.4/ 10
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Apple MacBook Pro 14 (M5, Late 2025)

Pros

Excellent screen, especially with the nano texture
Great performance
Good size and reasonable weight for everyday use
Same top-notch design as previous models

cons

The screen notch remains annoying
Significant drop in performance in low power mode
Only two external displays are supported on the M5 model
Prone to fingerprint smudges
The 70W adapter does not support fast charging

It’s not the big redesign we were hoping for this time last year, when Apple introduced its new design M4 models of MacBook Pro. In fact, there was no redesign at all. This generation of the 14-inch MacBook Pro is identical to the 2024 model (pricing remains unchanged, too) with one exception — it includes the M5 processor, which debuted this fall.

On the one hand, my test shows Upgraded GPU architecture of the chip It offers significant performance improvements over the M4 in the narrow areas where it applies, namely on-GPU processing for AI (particularly image generation) and ray-traced graphics. This is in line with Apple’s typical generation-over-generation performance improvements. So, as expected, one of the top consumer CPUs has gotten even better performance, bringing High-performance laptop In its wake.

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This upgrade builds on the laptop’s existing excellent design; Exceptional battery life (I’m still testing it, but the M4 model lasted 22 hours); And a gorgeous, color-accurate, bright, and wide-range HDR display that’s enhanced with the optional $150 non-reflective nano-coating. And it retains one of the best aspects of the MacBook Pro’s performance – not falling over when running on battery. There’s still a low power mode, where you can have great success, but the standard battery mode should be good enough for most situations.

Apple MacBook Pro 14 (M5, Late 2025)

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Price as reviewed	$1,949; £1,949; AU$3,029
an offer	14.2 inches Nano-texture, 3024 x 1964 pixels, 254 ppi, 14:9/16:10 aspect ratio; 1000 nits SDR, 1600 nits HDR; 120 Hz
CPU	4.61GHz Apple M5 10 cores (4P/6E)
memory	16GB LPDDR5
Graphics	Apple M5 is built-in 10 cores
storage	1TB SSD AP1024Z, SD card slot
Ports	3x USB-C/Thunderbolt 4 ports, 1x HDMI 2.1, 3.5mm audio
networks	Wi-Fi 6E (802.11ax), Bluetooth 5.3
Operating system	Mac Tahoe 26.0.1
weight	3.4 lbs (1.6 kg)

On the other hand, though, the performance gains for gaming don’t necessarily push it over the edge as it struggles, particularly for AAA games, into solid territory. The good is getting better but the permissible limits are getting closer.

Your choices for the MBP 14 are the M5 models, with the latest generation Thunderbolt 4 and up to two external displays, or the M4 Pro or Max system with the latest Thunderbolt 5 and, in the case of the Max, support for up to four external displays. They are all otherwise identical. The base M4 Pro model is the same price as the top-end M5 model at $1,999 and is probably a better deal. It has less storage space, but you can always add an external drive, and it offers better overall performance (with some narrow exceptions). As usual with MacBooks, I think the laptop is expensive but not overpriced.

Apple MacBook Pro 14-m5-7790 — By Lori Gronin/CNET

But there’s no compelling reason to upgrade to the M5 unless you really want to replace your current system. In this case, as always, you will at least enjoy better performance than you have now. For example, in applications that don’t require real-time rendering, such as 3D design, the improved ray tracing speed is an undoubted boon.

But if you’re switching from a Pro or Max laptop, things get a little murkier. For example, the M5 offers the fastest single-core CPU speeds I’ve seen in a consumer processor. But this doesn’t necessarily translate into the best overall performance – a processor with slower individual cores, but more of them, can outperform it.

Puzzle improve game performance

The more powerful versions of the chip (Pro and Max) are based on last year’s M4 architecture. So, even though the M5 has a faster, updated GPU with a new ray tracing acceleration suite, it doesn’t have enough GPU cores benefit greatly from additional RT accelerators. In practical terms, this means that games that ran well on the M4 — ones that don’t require extensive GPU usage, like Hades 2 — play slightly better on the M5.

Despite a 50% improvement in ray tracing throughput (according to 3DMark’s Solar Bay benchmark), this was hampered by the 10-core GPU. Take one of the few Mac games that uses ray tracing — enough for Apple to certify it as a showcase — Cyberpunk 2077.

Apple MacBook Pro 14-m5-7792 — By Lori Gronin/CNET

On the M5, I can get non-ray-traced frame rates up to a playable 70fps. But it was at 1800 x 1125 pixels and using Apple’s dynamic scaling system aggressively that it looked great. Bumping up the resolution to 1920 x 1200 using the same aiming settings looked a little better, but the frame rate dropped to around 60fps. I found the best resolution with ADS to be 2560 x 1600, but the frame rate dropped to about 44 fps. Ultimately, if you spend enough time tweaking the settings, you can make it work to your liking.

But throwing in ray tracing makes it slower without adding anything. The low ray tracing setting in Cyberpunk enhances local shadows slightly. Not worth it. Much better, but not better enough. If the chip were an M5 Pro or M5 Max, with more graphics cores, it might be a different story. We haven’t seen that yet.

For AI, adding neural accelerators on each GPU core makes image generation much faster. Surprisingly, I was able to run the GPU-based Procyon Stable Diffusion benchmark on battery — the M4’s battery was constantly dying before the test was over because it was so much less efficient.

Standard low-power on-device tasks (such as document drafting or webcam video processing) that use the CPU’s neural accelerator show minimal improvement because not much has changed in that group. The fixed 16 neural cores across the chips means that a default M5 Pro or Max won’t make a difference if that part of the architecture remains the same as the base M5.

Decisions, decisions

My typical advice is: If you don’t need it now, and if your current MacBook’s performance and feature set doesn’t bother you, wait. There’s nothing about the newer model that screams “must have!” Especially if we might see more powerful versions of the chip in the spring.

If you need to buy and are on a tight budget, you may be able to find M4 models on sale during Black Friday and the holidays. While I always think you’re better off buying the newest one when you buy, it’s probably not entirely necessary if you can’t afford it. (Plus, if you don’t need the Pro features,… The M4 MacBook Air 15 might be a better fit.)

But if you’re in the market and can benefit from an overall performance boost over your current base model MacBook or MacBook Pro across the board, you certainly won’t be disappointed with what the M5 MacBook Pro 14 has to offer.

Cinebench 2024 CPU (single core)

Apple MacBook Pro 14 (M5, 10C/10C), Low Power Mode 97Apple MacBook Pro 14 (M3, 8C/10C) 122Apple MacBook Pro 16 (M2 Pro, 12C/19C) 140Apple MacBook Pro 16 (M3 Max, 16C/40C) 140Apple MacBook Pro 14 (M4, 10C/10C) 174Apple MacBook Pro 16 (M4 Pro, 14C/20C) 178Apple MacBook Pro 14 (M5, 10C/10C) 199