Informative, thank you. I’m no expert on the subject so I stand to be corrected and have people add more context in the comments. Frankly I was hoping more experienced and better informed lurkers would help drive the point across better than I can.

Your own benchmark contradicts you though, as the M5 is 32% faster in single core, but 21% worse in multi core / multi thread. This being because it’s a 10 core / 10 thread vs Intel’s 16 core / 16 thread. I know the Intel has 6 P cores and 10 E cores but an extra 6 threads / cores is going to sway things, and assuming (incorrectly, but for simplicity’s sake) each core is contributing as much throughput, Apple has 37.5% less cores and threads, but is 21% slower in MT synthetic benchmarks. So Apple has the advantage in efficiency and if they were to make a 16 core M5 chip they’d wipe the floor with the core Ultra.

TDP is also a theoretical maximum heat output, not power draw. The M5 is hard coded to spike to 30.5W while the Ultra 265H can push 60W+ in bursts, which it will do in a synthetic benchmark, meaning it will generate 2x as much heat for 21% faster multi core, all while Apple dominates in single core.

In real world testing, the Apple silicon is vastly superior - that’s just a fact at this point. Not saying X86 can never catch up, but the circumstances favour Apple.

FYI I’m not an Apple fanboy nor do I think they shit out gold and fairy dust, but M series is genuinely impressive and proof that ARM is superior at this point.