Apple announced the M1 Macs in November. We bought two MacBook Pros to test them in real workloads — Nuxt builds, NativeScript Android packaging, multi-tab Chrome, a virtual machine running Windows for Visual Studio. Three weeks in, the verdict is striking. This is the first laptop generation in years that genuinely changes the shape of how a studio operates.
Real benchmarks, our workloads
| Task | 2019 Intel MBP (i9, 32GB) | M1 MBP (8GB) | M1 MBP (16GB) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Nuxt cold build | 2m 14s | 1m 28s | 1m 22s |
| Webpack hot reload (typical) | ~3s | <1s | <1s |
| NativeScript Android packaging | 4m 12s | 2m 41s | 2m 35s |
| Single tab YouTube + Slack idle | Fans on, ~25W | Silent, ~6W | Silent, ~7W |
| 10-tab dev session, fans engaged | Yes within 5min | Never (no fans) | Never (no fans) |
| Battery — typical mixed dev work | ~3 hours | ~10 hours | ~10 hours |
Measured workload performance, December 2020.
What got measurably faster
- 01 Nuxt build times dropped roughly 35% versus our 2019 Intel Pros.
- 02 Webpack hot reloads feel instant rather than 'noticeable'.
- 03 Multi-tab Chrome with eight Cursor / video / Slack / dev servers — no fan, no thermal throttle.
- 04 Battery life is approaching what Apple claims. That hasn't been true on a Mac laptop for years.
- 05 Wake from sleep is instant. The MacBook is now a phone-shaped experience.
- 06 Compile times for native Mac apps (Xcode projects) drop dramatically.
What broke or wobbled
- 01 Some Node modules with native bindings needed Rosetta. Most have ARM builds within weeks now.
- 02 Docker is slower than on Intel — it's running Linux under emulation. Improving, not fast yet.
- 03 A few production Electron apps had rough edges on launch day. All since patched.
- 04 Some Homebrew formulas need manual ARM builds. The bottle situation has improved fast but is not yet complete.
- 05 x86-only commercial software (some Adobe utilities, some VPN clients) runs under Rosetta and is mostly fine but occasionally weird.
Hardware rarely changes the shape of a studio. This one did. The build server we were about to buy is suddenly unnecessary — three M1 laptops together rival what an Intel Mac mini cluster gave us six months ago.
What we'd buy now (December 2020)
| Role | Recommended config | Why |
|---|---|---|
| Engineer (web) | M1 MacBook Pro 13, 16GB, 512GB | Future-proof for two years; 16GB matters for Docker |
| Engineer (native / heavy) | Wait for M1 Pro (rumoured 2021) | Base M1 maxes at 16GB; pro workloads will want more |
| Designer (Figma) | M1 MacBook Air, 8GB or 16GB | Genuinely fast enough; cheaper, lighter, no fan needed |
| Anyone running heavy x86 Docker / VMs | Keep Intel for now | Rosetta is fast but VMs are slow |
| Installations / kiosks | M1 Mac mini | Cheap, silent, fanless, perfect for permanent installs |
Apple Silicon buying matrix, December 2020.
Hardware rarely changes the shape of a studio. This one did. The build server we were about to buy is suddenly unnecessary. Engineers can take their MacBook to a coffee shop and have it last a working day. The whole thermal story has flipped — no fans, no throttling, full performance at room temperature. The M1 isn't an iteration. It's a different category of laptop, and Apple have brought it to market two years before anyone else.