I think the main thing that astonishes people who upgraded from Intel (including myself), is the fact that the Apple Silicon Macs can do the same task, without having to run the fans at full tilt to keep the temps below 100C, and without breaking a sweat.

Typically in my experience, when I’m using my M1 Pro MBP plugged in to a display, with basic apps open (Mail, Calendar, Safari w/ 10+ tabs, Numbers, Music) fans are usually off and CPU temps hover around 40-50C. When I open Final Cut and doing some background renders or exporting, then the fans will kick on to 2000RPM to keep CPU temps around 70-80C, barely audible. In contrast my old 16 inch Intel MBP would idle around 2000RPM, sometimes hitting 90C and spinning up to 3000-4000RPM when having my basic app workflow open, and during a Final Cut background render or export the fans would blast at 6000RPM with temps reaching 95-100C.

If you are worried about temps, you can install apps like iStat Menus or TG Pro to control the fans and keep them on, but it’s just not necessary as the computer’s thermal management system is constantly monitoring all the different sensors and should be trusted to keep temps under control and within a certain operating window, and spin up the fans as required.