Early benchmark scores for the A19 Pro chip in the just-announced iPhone 17 Pro show a whopping 40% increase in graphics performance compared to last year’s model. The boost in overall performance isn’t nearly so dramatic, however.
We also have a preliminary benchmark for the A19 in the base model iPhone 17, and it’s apparently going to be just slightly faster than its most recent predecessor.
A19 Pro in iPhone 17 Pro: Amazing graphics performance
When unveiling the A19 Pro during its Awe Dropping product launch Tuesday, Apple called the chip’s six-core CPU “the fastest CPU in any smartphone.” But the company did not get specific about expected performance.
The A19 Pro powers the iPhone 17 Pro and the new razor-thin iPhone Air, although the slim phone runs on a binned version with only five GPU cores rather than the six GPU cores in the Pro model.
The iPhone 17 Pro, available for preorders this Friday, has not yet reached customers. However, some reviewers apparently have the device in hand and have begun running benchmark tests. The chip gets about 9700 on the Geekbench 6 multi-core CPU test. That’s a 14% improvement over the iPhone 16 Pro, but a 70% performance gain over the iPhone 13 Pro.
iPhone 17 benchmarks for A19 chip
Early benchmark scores for the base model iPhone 17 also surfaced Wednesday. The device, which runs on Apple’s new A19 chip, earned an 8810 on the Geekbench 6 multi-core CPU test. That’s a 7% increase over the iPhone 16, but an 86% improvement over the iPhone 13.
The fairly modest CPU performance improvement versus last year’s model could be because the A19 and A18 both use a 3nm production process, though this was somewhat improved for the newer chip. Apple reportedly will make next year’s A20 chip with a new 2nm process, which should bring a noticeable performance jump.
It should also be noted that all these iPhone 17 series benchmark scores are preliminary. It’s not known under what conditions the tests were performed. Tests done by reviewers might generate unusual results.
A19 Pro offers hefty graphic improvements
Someone also benchmarked the graphic performance of the A19 Pro’s 6-core GPU in the iPhone 17 Pro. It scored 45657 on the Geekbench 6 Metal test. That’s 40% better than the iPhone 16 Pro scores on the same test, as noted previously. It’s a 121% improvement over the iPhone 13 Pro on the same Metal test.
The iPhone 17 Pro seems ready to run the console-quality AAA games headed for the handset. The lengthy list includes Fortnite, multiple entries from the Resident Evil series, Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown and Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light.
Ed Hardy has been writing full-time about tech for 25 years, and using it for much longer than that. His intro to Apple was a Macintosh Classic II (which he still has), but now he uses a 13-inch iPad Pro as his primary computer. He’s written for NotebookReview, TabletPCReview, and Brighthand, as well as other sites.
